Eula McGill Interview 7

EULA MCGILL: -- they said -- he said, "Once in a while she might intimidate me for a second or two," he says. But it was such a good relationship. But a lot of men couldn't stand that, couldn't stand a woman being more out in front than he was, you know, overshadowed him.

JUDITH HELFAND: What was it like actually when you were working in the mills and you were working at your spinning frame and the bosses came around?

MCGILL: I never had no problem with them. Like I said, I never had no problem with them. They never -- I was never attracted to them. They never bothered me. I seen them do others, you know, not harass but try to go with us. We didn't call it harassment. I never knew of a girl being threatened to be fired, but my own personal knowledge. But I do know about this man that worked over here in this steel plant that his wife went with his boss for him to hold 00:01:00his job. And that man sat and cried. He said, "Eula -- he just wanted to talk to somebody. "People might not think I'm much of a man," but he said, "I got my children to feed." It was during the depression, it was tough to find a job. It happened and a lot of instances like that happened. I knew -- well I know of another case where this man -- this man boarded with this couple. He slept with this man's wife that he boarded with.

HELFAND: Was he a superintendent or a mill boss?

MCGILL: I don't know. I don't remember anymore. But I just couldn't understand it, but I knew that -- he told me about it because he used to go out on parties with us and do parties. She didn't care because she was the one 00:02:00living with him is the husband. Why he didn't leave her, I don't know. They didn't have any children. But he went with other women. But this man lived there with them, supposed to be subordinate, but he was actually more like the husband, you know, sleeping with her.

HELFAND: You told us a story once about when all the lights went off in --

MCGILL: Oh yeah, yeah, oh yeah.

HELFAND: Can you tell us that again?

MCGILL: Well I didn't see it but the guy told me. The lights went out and one of the bosses took one of the girls back there on the floor and the other boys told me about it. He didn't much like it. The woman told him she wasn't into it.

HELFAND: Would people leave the mill village?

MCGILL: There's a lot of women that liked to play up to the bosses. They thought they'd get them somewhere. They was fools, but they thought that. I told one of them when she said, "The boss can't do nothing to me." She said, "I've got it on him." I said, "Hell he's the boss, he can fire any damn time. What you going to do? You tell on yourself too." He's got 00:03:00as much on you as you got on him.

HELFAND: Could the women do anything at the time, I'm talking before --

MCGILL: As I know, I don't know of any of them in my own personal knowledge except that one time like I told you in the last one there that the boss told me about. And he thought it was terrible, but I think that was all consent. I mean I think it was not harassment. But I heard of it that girls -- that guy they talked about that I was telling you about, that Wild Bill they talked about that went to Dwight Mills after I left after the new company bought and they fired JD Loner and that man went in there. We called him Wild Bill. The women -- some of the women who worked in the mill that I knew told me he was the worst. And I did know that -- oh, one case was at the shirt factory. I had 00:04:00heard about this boss. It was a union shop. And I was later assigned there as a business agent. Well I had heard about him imposing on the girls. And there's a man business agent there. And people in that locale never did think a woman could be a business agent. They never would have a man -- nothing but a man business agent. And when we got into fight with District 50, they tried to take our locale over, they beat up all the men business agents that went in there. So Gladys sent me in there, didn't think they'd harass a woman, but they did, but I outsmarted them. I had heard about this. People talk about this. Joe [Stagowitz?], big old robust and poised guy. So I never could get any of the girls to come tell me what he said to him and then I couldn't get him to face it. I couldn't do nothing if they didn't let me take it up. 00:05:00Oh, no, no, no, no, they're scared of him. So one girl -- one day one of the stewards -- she was a good union steward. She said, "You got a girl that's ready to face [Joe Stag?]." And I said, "You have." She said yes so she brought her over there. And so she told me Joe told her -- asked her for a date -- that's putting it lightly. And she said -- turned him down. He said, "What in the hell do you think I'm paying you 40 cents an hour for. So we went over there and that young fellow that has his picture, he's plant manager, he had no goods whatsoever. He was scared of Joe Stagowitz. And I walked in. I said, "Donald I have heard stories about Joe Stagowitz insulting these girls and intimidating them into going with him, talking, cursing, and 00:06:00talking ugly to him up there on the job. I never have been able to have anybody file a grievance. Now I got the grievance filed and I want Joe down here." He said, "I'm going to agree with Joe, he don't ever have to come into union grievance meetings." I said, "I want Joe Stagowitz down here." He come to door. He wouldn't look up at you. So I said, "Joe," I said, "I heard about you a long time before I come here. You've been talked about harassing women, your vulgar talk, now I got a woman that's filed a grievance against you. And she said that when she turns you down you ask her what in the 00:07:00hell that she thought you was paying her 40 cents an hour for. In the first place, you ain't paying her nothing. The company's paying her. In the second place, it'd be worth a hell of a sight more than 40 cents an hour to be seen out with you." And that ended it with Joe. I never had no trouble with him after that. And not long after that, he quit and left, left the factory. And them girls was pleased when he quit.

HELFAND: Now do you think that --

MCGILL: Nobody had ever stood up to him. Why I don't know? A man business agent -- a lot of women won't talk -- back then, it's a little better now -- wouldn't talk to a man about things that would another woman.

HELFAND: Back in -- back in -- back in '32 -- '33 when you were working at Selma, do you think that because of these sexual favors that you knew about or you heard about, but that certainly were commonplace in lots of other mills, was this something that the women felt like they had any recourse or their families 00:08:00felt like they had any recourse?

MCGILL: I don't know how they fell or felt. I don't know how they felt. But I think a lot of the women thought they were putting themselves in a better position job-wise if they had a relationship with the boss. I believe that.

HELFAND: Do you think that --

MCGILL: I'll never forget one time Joe when I was organizing the union -- that's a boss of mine. You know, I told you he was a good fellow. We was trying to organize a union. Well a little girl come down there went to work. Bless her heart, she was way up in the mountains and she went to work and she was string headed, just wasn't attractive at all. And Joe said, "I bet you never would get her to join the union." And I said, "I bet I will." And he said, "I bet you don't." And he said, "I'll bet you a dollar." I said, "All right, that's a bet." So like I said, Joe never had to try 00:09:00to -- he never put no pressure on people in a bad way. He got to going over there and taking her candy, flirting with her and talking to her. She got her a permanent wave and got to using lipstick and fixing herself up, you know. She thought Joe was really after her, you know. She didn't know nothing about all this. So that went on and I just got on the end of my rope. I couldn't get her to sign a card. And he was paying me two dollars a week more than he was anybody else. That was an agreement he made with me a long time back over some old frames he couldn't keep nobody on. He said if you'll go over there and run them frames -- because I wasn't no good spinner which is why these girls that worked around me helped me -- he said, "If you'll go over there and run them frames, I'll give you two dollars a week more than you're getting now." Everybody was getting the same money. So I went over and that first payday I didn't get. And I went to him and I said, "How about my two bucks?" "What?" "You know you promised me two dollars." "Well I 00:10:00don't know how I'm going to do it." I said, "That's your problem." Well anyhow, I got two dollars a week more after that. They was making five dollars and ten cents a week, I was making seven dollars and ten cents a week which was carfare. So I just couldn't -- it was payday night. We was in -- I had the box turn down there in the toilet, sit down and change our shoes. We went in there and changed our shoes getting ready because it's quitting time. I said, "Are you ever going to join the union?" "Oh no," she says, "They've been so good to me. I can't afford to join the union." She said, "They've been so good to me." I said, "They're better to me than they are to you and I'm for the union all the way." She said, "What do you mean?" I said, "I make more money than you do." She said, "You don't. We all make the same." I said, "If I can prove to you that I make more money than you do, will you join the union?" "I sure will because you can't prove it." And I brought out my pay envelope, it was payday. I 00:11:00showed it to her. She signed the card. So I told Joe, "I got her." He said, "How'd you get her?" I said, "I hated to use you Joe, but you was doing everything you could. You was toting her candy and cocoa and doing everything underhanded you could short of actually dating her." And I said, "I used a difference in pay." He said, "Fair enough."

HELFAND: Did you keep your two dollars?

MCGILL: Oh yeah, he --

HELFAND: Now I don't get it. I was under the impression that come -- come the NRA you were all getting --

MCGILL: This was before NRA. We was trying to organize a union.

HELFAND: You were trying to organize a union before the NRA?

MCGILL: Yeah, yeah, yeah. The owner was -- Dwight Mill had strikes before NRA. 00:12:00Yeah, we knew what was coming. We was getting a head start. In fact, when Roosevelt got elected, before he put his program into effect, some of the mills went on eight hour days to try to get the best hands. Comer over at Avondale went on eight hour day before it went law into effect. And a lot of people quit and went over there because they couldn't get a job over there before. And some nights we couldn't even start up. We didn't have enough hands to start up with because people was quitting and going where they can get an eight hour day before the law went into effect. Comer Mills did it -- went on an eight hour day because they knew it was coming and they wanted to try to get hold of the best hands. Oh yeah, some of the things that we were doing even before then because we saw the handwriting on the wall. We knew the promise of Roosevelt when he was running. We was getting our ducks in a row here in -- that's why 00:13:00I saw northern Alabama was different than other places. We had a head start.

HELFAND: Tell us a little bit about Roosevelt getting elected and what you thought he was going to -- what you thought Roosevelt was going to represent for the cotton mill folks.

MCGILL: Not only cotton mill folks, for all workers, a right to -- a real right to get a right to organize. That was the main thing. And nobody can really know what it was like working before you had any protection at all. You know, we got us wages and hours low right here in Alabama. It ain't much. But they got a minimum wage law in effect in the state of Alabama. But I don't know -- 00:14:00I'm going to find somebody to try to look into that. It's mighty low. But these restaurant workers here only get two dollars an hour, the restaurant workers. I read an article the other day, they practically have to live on tips. Now that's a bad -- and they have no conditions, see, no other conditions whatsoever. And they get paid two dollars and hour. And I read a long time ago what the minimum wage for the state was, but I don't remember it. I'll have to find out because most of the people, they don't think of minimum wages in across state, they think of interstate. I was talking a woman the other day. I said we have a minimum wage law here in Alabama. She said, "No we don't." I said, "Yeah, I don't know what it is." I said, "There's one here in Alabama. There's a minimum wage law." "No," she said, "There's a federal minimum wage law." I said, "No there's a 00:15:00state minimum wage law but I forget what it was." I read one time what it was. But I don't know what it is. But surely it's more than two dollars an hour.

HELFAND: But before -- maybe you could talk about --

MCGILL: See that's for people that don't -- that's not in interstate commerce, intrastate.

HELFAND: Before you told us about FDR and the first time you voted and saving the money for the poll tax.

MCGILL: I borrowed it. Save it? We couldn't save no money. I borrowed it from the postman. I don't know if I ever paid him back or not, can't remember.

HELFAND: Tell us that whole story.

MCGILL: Well of course see I'd been politically active all my life. My daddy -- I was politically helped. I knew what the score was as far as politics is concerned.

HELFAND: Even so young?

MCGILL: Yeah. My daddy educated us. We talked politics around the table all my life. That's when we talked things about politics. And everything -- papa was just -- he always, like he said, like my son, he did him the same ways he did me. Now my sister didn't pay him much attention as I did. She was older. I mean she was married when I was eleven, she was 18. But papa and me had a lot of good talks. And my son, my father's responsible for my son's thinking today. But I was always was -- I couldn't vote of course because I wasn't 21. But I was politically active before I could ever vote. I got out and worked women suffrage when I was a kid, you know when they was talking about women's suffrage, women's right. There wasn't much I could do except talk about it and think about it, but I was aware. So when I turned 21 and Roosevelt 00:17:00run, that was the year I turned 21, 1932. So I borrowed a dollar and a half, payed the poll tax to vote for Roosevelt because I felt like here's a man that's going to give us a chance. I don't know what other people thought. Of course they thought -- just like it is today. When less than 40% of the registered voters vote, we ain't got much of a democracy. Less than 40% of the registered voters -- people who are registered, not counting them who ain't registered. Less than 40% of the registered voters goes to the polls and votes.

HELFAND: So what did Roosevelt and his New Deal administration mean to all of you here in Alabama and particularly in the cotton mill?

MCGILL: I don't know about the rest of the people, but I was way ahead of them politically, you see. I expected him to do something to help workers be able to 00:18:00have some job security and raise their pay and give us a right -- you see we shouldn't have to let the government protect us. The government ought to give us a right to protect our right to do it. Not do it for us, but protect our right to do it. When they give you a right to do something, if you don't do it, then that's your fault. You can't blame nobody but yourself. But most of us, when Roosevelt got elected, we just felt like here was a man who was a friend of the common man. And the sky was the limit. It was just like -- if I had to explain it, it was just like when John F. Kennedy was elected president. The next day it seemed like to me a different look on people's faces. You see I remember when Al Smith run on the Democratic Party. He was beat because he 00:19:00was a Catholic. And we had a Republican governor here in Alabama because Al Smith was a Democrat -- they deserted him because he was Catholic. Well I remembered that. And I was working and he announced -- John F. Kennedy announced officially from Warm Springs, Georgia at that little white house. And I was working in [Brinkman?]. I got up early that morning and drove down there. I wanted to see what kind of reception he'd get. From Carlton, Georgia all the way to Columbus, the road was lined with people standing aside the road waiting for him to pass by. When I got into Warm Springs, I couldn't get nowhere near the Little White House. I had to park way up in the little old town and walk in there. They was hanging from trees. They even tore down the 00:20:00sound system, so many people in trees. They had to repair it. He was two hours late getting there because of the people on the side of the road. He insisted he'd stop and talk along the way to them. He couldn't get down there. You never saw such an outpouring of friendship and hope as was among that crowd that day. And it wasn't just curiosity. It was here was a man that they felt that was going to be able to, after so many dry years, would do something for us. And I often wonder if he hadn't have got killed just what would have happened. I did not like Bobby Kennedy. I didn't trust Bobby Kennedy, never did. In fact, when John F. -- John F. -- when John Kennedy was senator, he spoke at one of our conventions. That was when Robert was on the [McClean?] committee. And 00:21:00it was supposed to be investigated McClean over -- and he fought Social Security on McClean from Kentucky -- from Arkansas. It was his committee. He was supposed to be inspecting or investigating labor management relationships, but he was more harassing the unions. So Robert was his chief there because Robert was a climber. So I would not stand listening to John -- John Kennedy speak. I left to hog. Somebody said ain't you going to hear John Kennedy speak? I said when he gets his brother off that McClean committee I'll listen to him. The minute he announced for president, he got Robert off that committee.

HELFAND: Was it the same feeling of that hope, that lining up the streets? Was that the same feeling that was -- I mean, could you describe that feeling that 00:22:00people had for Roosevelt or that you had for Roosevelt?

MCGILL: Well it wasn't exactly the same. Here you had a Catholic, the first Catholic. But I attributed it to since we had World War II and people had learned from north, south, east, and west, all over, they learned a little more about it. They were more religious tolerant. But it wasn't exactly the same because you was bringing -- you was bringing -- with Roosevelt, you was bringing people out of the depths of the depression where they was practically starving to death. When Kennedy came in, we had -- every so often they deserved to have some Republicans a while to learn what it is. You never learned from nobody -- you could tell somebody, but very few pay any attention. They have to learn it themselves. So every once in a while you have to have these Republicans come in to teach people a lesson to know how important the Democratic Party is.

HELFAND: But when Roosevelt was -- I just want to go back to it because that's the thing that we've been trying to understand.

MCGILL: I don't know what you want me to say.

HELFAND: OK, well, what I'm trying to -- what we've been under the impression --

[break in video]

MCGILL: -- need a job.

M1: Eula, we don't care about Kennedy. What we want to know is how you felt about Roosevelt? What was it like when Roosevelt got --

MCGILL: Well this one's easy at to Kennedy.

HELFAND: Right, right, but I was --

MCGILL: There's a difference. People felt like Roosevelt was going to be able to give them a job and a way to make a living. With Kennedy, it was more like they was going to get a little more political freedom.

HELFAND: But didn't people feel -- what I'm trying to get back to in understanding Roosevelt -- didn't people feel a sense of freedom also that -- along with --

MCGILL: They may have always felt it but it had been suppressed. I said earlier that I think they felt like Roosevelt would back them and protect them -- and protect them and back them. They felt like they had somebody who would encourage them to carry out their wishes. That's what I've always said that when Roosevelt got elected -- and we had some good people elected from Alabama 00:24:00at that time too. We've had some outstanding people from Alabama. And I tried to tell them in '76 when I came back here the Republican Party was fixing to get all the young people here in Alabama. The Democratic Party better get off of their fanny and start working. They didn't listen and still ain't listening. They're lazy here in Alabama.

HELFAND: When he brought the NRA in, could you describe the NRA and Section 7A to us?

MCGILL: Well it was just a one little section in there that gave them a right to organize. The rest of it was about other things. But that one section, 7A, gave us a right to organize without any fear of discrimination. That one little -- couple of little lines in there that set forth a right to organize, Section 7A. I can't remember the whole NRA. It set forth wages and hours and things. 00:25:00But in there it gave a right to organize, just two little lines as I remember it was all that was in there, that workers should have a right to organize without fear of -- protect them and -- the law would protect them. That law you know was declared unconstitutional about two years later.

HELFAND: But before the law was declared unconstitutional, that law -- the NRA went into place -- I guess the summer of 1933, right? The summer of 1933. And people started organizing immediately didn't they? That's what I meant by -- Section 7A gave people this bill of freedom because they could organize.

MCGILL: In the mines especially they tried it in World War II. It failed. In the mines it started first around here. The steel mills, we didn't get nowhere at that time. We couldn't get enough interest in steel mills, but the 00:26:00mine workers and mine workers got organized. You see, as I'm saying, I can't speak for the rest of the country because I stayed here and the industrial area was entirely different.

F1: What about all the letters that even the textile workers were writing, all the letters that all the labor people were sending to Roosevelt saying, "Look, they're not following Section 7A, we're not getting --

MCGILL: I was fixing to say, the NRA was a miserable failure as far as wages and hours was concerned. The company had a way to get around it. The people were afraid to say anything about it just like the wages and hours law today is violated, especially overtime provision, violated -- scandalously violated. But people are afraid to complain. They won't make a complaint.

F1: How about the sense of participation as citizens that the people felt through writing their letters?

MCGILL: They don't even go to vote, how are they going to participate?

F1: But back then, we found so many letters from textile workers --

MCGILL: I don't know how many. I've heard about it. I don't know. 00:27:00I've just heard, you know, that same thing like you said, people wrote him letters and I bet they did.

HELFAND: That's what we were -- we were under the impression that people were so excited about the NRA --

MCGILL: I never knew of anybody that wrote him a letter.

HELFAND: So let's --

MCGILL: You see what I'm saying? I've heard -- and no doubt some people did, but I don't -- I do feel that they felt, uh, that they had somebody in the White House that would protect them and see -- or do what they could to protect their rights which they already had the right if they had enough sense to think about. The Bill of Rights gives you that right. This just more or less put props under the Bill of Rights, Section 7A. People had these rights under the Constitution of the United States their whole life, the first and 00:28:00fourth amendment. Your right under the Bill of Rights -- you've got all of these rights. But they ain't spelled out so everybody could get them, but Section 7A is more or less fortified the Bill of Rights for us.

HELFAND: And then what happened? That went into effect --

MCGILL: Well the NRA, like the wages and hours -- wages and hours laws today has been flagrantly violated, especially the overtime provision.

HELFAND: When I said and then what happened, I'm actually -- specifically I mean in terms of organizing and the notion, "OK, now we have the right to organize in Section 7A, so now what do we do?"

MCGILL: Well unfortunately --

HELFAND: I mean in '33. If I'm not clear, I'm sorry.

MCGILL: Well I can only speak for the area I'm in. You must realize that I wasn't broadly travelled in 1933. I didn't talk to as many people. I only knew the people right here in Birmingham who I talked to and in Gadsden, 00:29:00that's the only areas I knew. Now Gadsden, you had an entirely different situation because like I told you in World War I, practically everything in Gadsden was organized. And it wasn't too long from World War I to 1933. And there's a lot of people that was still alive that had the courage to do what they did during World War I in Gadsden. And you -- and we would not have lost our labor movement in Gadsden had it not been for the depression which closed down a lot of those little shops that we had the big membership in. There was a lot of little shops there, little machine shops and things that couldn't survive -- and the Hosiery Mills and the overall factory that closed in the depression. And that's where the unions were because the big factories had been able to keep the union out like Gulf State Steel and Dwight Mill. But the 00:30:00car works had failed. The car -- they had to close down. We had a big membership there with the -- where they made repairs and the Agricola Steel work where they made range coal stoves, that business is gone to hell because they didn't cook with stone, they cooked with gas. And so a lot of the industry had failed during the depression. So it weakened the labor movement in Gadsden. At that time, see I was up there. I didn't come to Birmingham and get into it until the late '20s. So I can't say what happened in Birmingham up until then. My brother-in-law was in the union, in the plasters union, you see, all during those years.

HELFAND: OK, so then let's talk about Birmingham 1933 right after the NRA goes into effect. What starts to happen in your mill in terms of, "OK, we have the right to organize. How do we start to form a union?" What were the steps?

MCGILL: Well we had people in our -- like I told you before, we had some people in our mills who had been members of unions. They had been members -- we had two that worked in that big machine shop in Decatur where it closed down because they blamed the union for it closing, but it wasn't. The improvement of the machine, they didn't have to stop and work on the machines -- on the locomotives between Nashvile and Birmingham like they had to in previous years. So the closed down their works in Decatur that was union, see. It was a railroad repair shop. And they had been able to perfect the engines to where they didn't have to stop in Decatur and have anything done to them. They could drive -- run it all the way from Nashville to Birmingham. And this is what the railroad workers explained to me when I run into that in Decatur about, "Oh the union shut down our railroad shop down here." When I talk to railroad workers, they explained to me why the shop closed because it wasn't 00:32:00needed because the engines didn't need servicing between Nashville and Birmingham which made sense to me. And anybody else that wanted to make sense -- it was something to hide your fear behind. But we were different in here. You see, most of the people through here had been subjected to unions all these years. They had been here. There had been unions around here for ten years and they never died. Just like -- we got a contract the other day -- well today about a year ago in Columbus, Georgia -- Columbus, Mississippi. We had been working on 40 years. Forty years ago Charlie English called me up. He had retired. He was the vice president later. He wasn't the vice president when I first met him, but he called me up and he said, "What do you think about [Seminole?] getting organized?" I said, "Well them people over there 00:33:00didn't organize it." Everybody that ever had a hand in Seminole 40 years ago up to date had a hand in organizing that shop. He said, "Those are my sentiments entirely." All of the sudden then people thought they'd organize that shop. It was 40 years. But the faithful people still stayed in there. It just so happened that the time become right and you had a nucleus in there of people who called on organizers when they felt like that. And they got it. Another thing is that a lot of those white people -- I had them say it to me, this is something that I wonder about sometimes. But I've had many a black person -- a white person say to me, "Why don't you talk to the black people first and get them to join, they'd be afraid to do anything with them?" The 00:34:00black influence in a lot of these shops had a lot to do with the change in getting the unions too and I think in particular in Seminole. But I don't know how many times I've had white people tell me, "Get the blacks first. They'd be afraid to do anything to them." Even politicians, when they want something done that they think is unpopular, they'll get a black person to do it because they feel like they can get by with what they can. And the black people know that and they do it.

HELFAND: What about at the --

MCGILL: -- legislation that some white people wants -- thinks should be done but they're too scared to do it, politically afraid of repercussions. But the black people ain't afraid like that.

HELFAND: And what about at the time when you were organizing your mill in 1933, how many black people worked at the Selma Manufacturing Plant?

MCGILL: In the spinning department there weren't but two. I don't know otherwise. There weren't but two in there. I remember Joe telling me her name was Rosa, worked in it. He says, "You going to take Rosa into the union?" I said, "You got her hired in here ain't you." He said, "Yeah, you going to call her sister?" I said, "Yeah." I said, "It's a hell of sight better than the stuff you've been calling her."

HELFAND: Did she join?

MCGILL: Yeah. And the funny -- oh let me think -- I guess there's about -- I'm trying to think in the union hall because they would go there and go sit together. Nobody segregated, but they'd invariably sit in one place together. And we never had a segregated meeting. We never said whites on one side and blacks on the other. We never did that. But in our little mill, we didn't -- 00:36:00I think that it must've been eight or ten sitting back then as I remember. There's one little place they'd go sit together not because they was told to, it just so happened they'd get one little place in there and that's where they'd sit together in that hall.

HELFAND: Was there a policy?

MCGILL: No, I'm saying nobody said nothing. They'd just automatically went and sit there. Now the steel workers, over at the [Ensley Steel Workers Hall?], one side was white and one side was black because they had a lot of blacks. I'd say 50% of them was black. And then also before the union they had certain jobs they couldn't be put on. There's certain jobs that are black jobs and certain jobs that are white jobs. Just like in the factories, there'd be certain jobs that were men jobs and certain jobs that were women jobs.

HELFAND: In the cotton mill, what could the black workers do?

MCGILL: There wasn't too many black people in the mills. They weren't hired. I guess the company as afraid of repercussions. You see, it's all economics. It's really nothing because their black. It's fear of their losing their job. It's all economics. The whole issue to me is because of economics. As long as they can keep the black people in their place, they called it, where they couldn't aspire themselves. They were more or less set to have certain jobs. Certain jobs was created for blacks and certain jobs created for whites. It was just a silent rule in the steel mills. But that was not true much in the mines. The dug coal in the mines together because you couldn't very well do that in the mine because you had to dig the coal where in the hell the coal's at.

HELFAND: Now in and around the cotton mills -- when I say in the mills, I know that black workers --

MCGILL: They used to put them on janitorial jobs, cleaning. Well our restrooms weren't never cleaned. So there was no such thing as janitors in the mill I worked in. There was no such thing. Maybe the watchmen at night would sweep the toilet out. Hardly was no toilet paper in there. It was miserable.

HELFAND: Now when I mention policy -- I'm going to jump a little --

MCGILL: They ain't got no policies.

HELFAND: No, no, no, I mean the [UTWA?] did they decide whether there should be blacks and whites in the unions together? That's what I'm trying to understand.

MCGILL: As far as I know and I wasn't in the UTWA long, you see we went to CIO. As far as I know there was no discrimination to creed, color, and all of 00:39:00the union, bylaws of the constitution that I've ever seen.

HELFAND: So back in '33 when you were organizing your mill, did you all decide as a group?

MCGILL: We never discussed it because there wasn't that many people -- blacks involved in the mill I was in. Black-white issue hardly ever was discussed. I don't even remember discussing it. And the few that come, they come in the union hall, and they sat where they want to sat. They sat together, but not because they was told, or not because they was restricted, they just automatically did it. Black people was trained from childhood, you don't do this, you're black, you're not supposed to do so and so. Kids was taught from little ones, you don't look a white man in the eye when you talk to him. Did you know that? They never was allowed to say nothing back whether you agreed with them or not. You said yes ma'am, no ma'am. A lot of the white -- a lot of the black people that was talking to was smarter than the person 00:40:00that's talking, but they knew that they -- to keep peace they --

HELFAND: So Eula, was this the first -- was the first time in your union hall that you think blacks and whites were ever part of the same group?

MCGILL: I don't know because we never had to have a union before. And then before that I don't think there was very many blacks who worked in mills -- in steel mills -- in the steel mills there was a lot of blacks and there was a lot of black women who worked in there during World War I. They wouldn't hire no white women, but they hired black women. But there was certain jobs that they was restricted to. They couldn't have certain jobs that wasn't considered black jobs, negro jobs. Now I didn't know of any black people in cotton mills, certainly not in Dwight. And this one out here, they had janitorial or 00:41:00-- I don't know what some of them black people did. Rosa and that other women, they was spinners up there on the spinner floor. They was the only two I knew that worked in the spinner room. I don't know what them others did. They worked the weave shop or card room or somewhere.

HELFAND: Maybe they'd broke bails on the outside.

MCGILL: Maybe so, yeah, something like that.

HELFAND: Go to the picking room.

MCGILL: I don't know if we broke bails over there at Selma or not. We did at Dwight. They may have come in there already broke up.

HELFAND: No, was there a woman named Mary too? Mary, who worked in your mill, a black woman named Mary who worked in your mill with you?

MCGILL: Not as far as I can remember, only Rosa.

HELFAND: So the first time you told us part of that story, you mentioned that her name was Mary.

MCGILL: I think I was talking about the woman who worked next to me called [Maddie?]. There was a Maddie who worked next to me. She was a white woman. She was the one who kept me out -- kept me up. She was one of my best helpers. 00:42:00You might've misunderstood me or I might've called it wrong. But Maddie worked in -- she was one of the women that helped me get my job up. She was a good spinner. She'd done all my cleaning for me because I knocked my roving down. I wasn't no fit to be a spinner. I shouldn't have been a spinner. It was the worst place -- you talk about putting a person on a job they weren't suited for. My God, they was crazy to put me on that job. They didn't get no work out of me because I was no good at it.

HELFAND: Well why didn't they fire you?

MCGILL: Huh?

HELFAND: Why didn't they fire you?

MCGILL: I don't know. Joe just -- they needed the job. Joe's protection I guess. But these people helped me. That woman just would run my frames a day, she'd have my frames cleaned when I got in there. Then before we left, Maddie would clean them for me. You see, we had to clean all under there on that rover and clean those spindles and everything off as well as run the machines. We had 00:43:00to clean them, clean the gears and all that. I can clean the gears, but when I start trying to clean all that roving, my big hands, I'd knock it down. And then I'd tear my hands all to hell. I hated it. I'd throw rocks at the place now. God I wouldn't go in one of them -- my dad used to say I might do it for bread, but I wouldn't do it for meat and bread.

HELFAND: Working in the cotton mill?

MCGILL: I guess it's different. I'm going to go in one of these days in one of them big mills. It's not cotton anymore, that's why they call them textile. It used to be cotton mills. It ain't cotton no more. It's synthetics. And it's altogether different I'm sure because they take it from liquids, you see, and make it into a -- I got to go some of these days up to Carolina and go in one of them big mills and see what it's like. I can't 00:44:00imagine -- see, we used to break the cotton down and come down and run it through different processes to get to spinning and then to spooling to break it down so you could weave it. But now it comes in as a liquid. It's made out of chemicals and it has to go through processes before they could get it into a -- like a string.

HELFAND: It's a different world.

MCGILL: Yeah. That's why they call it more textile now. It ain't cotton mills no more, it really is textile. I doubt -- there's very few -- well cotton is coming back to some degree. A lot of people is realizing it's cooler than anything else. It's very cool. It absorbs sweat. You're cooling in cotton than you are in synthetics.

HELFAND: Um, so -- if we could -- let's go -- can we go back to the point where you all started organizing your union local, at the very, very beginning 00:45:00when you really started to put it together back in '33. Maybe you could tell us about the first --

MCGILL: Well I told you though that they kept me quiet. They kept me isolated. They was scared of me. It started without my knowledge because they was afraid of me. I didn't live nowhere, I rode the -- I got there and went to work and rode a streetcar home. I wasn't associating in the area with the people. There were -- I think because I dressed a little better and rode a streetcar and changed clothes when I got there and left my work clothes and changed and went back on the streetcar, they did not trust me. They didn't mention nothing about the union. The second hand, the one that told me they was organizing a union, told me about the meeting, and asked me to go to spy for him. I told you that, you know. So I went to the meeting. I was glad to hear about it. I didn't go to spy for him. I went because I believed in the union because I 00:46:00was raised to believe in it. But these people didn't know me. I had nothing to do with any of the people in the mill because I was never there except to go to work. I didn't live in the neighborhoods. I lived on the other side of town. They didn't know me. And consequently they was afraid to approach me about the union in the beginning. So this boss found out about it -- straw boss -- second hand we call them. He come and asked me, "Do you know they was trying to organize a union?" And I said, "No." He said, "Yeah, they're having a meeting Saturday morning at ten o'clock." He said, "How about going over there and coming back and letting me know what happened?" I said, "OK." I got up in the morning, went over there, walked in the hall, joined the union, wound up secretary of the local. They didn't give me a chance. They had never approached me, never gave me a chance 00:47:00to see -- you never do know. I know that -- I learned a lot -- I learned from that experience to ask everybody. You never could guess who would be for the union and who won't be for the union. I also learned, the higher paid the worker -- the highest paid worker in the shop at a piece work shop is the best person to talk to about the union because they're actually fast than them lowered paid workers, get a better piece rate, they'd make more money. The people that was making pretty good money in low piece rates. If you get to piece rates anywhere like that, they're going to be making a lot more money than they are. And you're better off to talk to them people that are already earning more.

HELFAND: You said -- you said that you wound up becoming secretary of the local. That took a little bit of time. Could you describe that process?

MCGILL: Well I got acquainted with Albert [Cox?] and John Dean. They came -- 00:48:00the two organizers here in the state. Alice Berry who worked in the mill with me started going with John Dean. And he put her on the staff that's what John did. So they used to stay at our house at night. They'd come in and they had no money to spend for hotel bills.

HELFAND: But how did they get to get so friendly with you? What I mean is, nothing -- it all doesn't happen so fast. There's got to be a little bit of a process right?

MCGILL: No, I can say it faster than it happened.

HELFAND: OK, so tell us -- don't tell us the fast way. Tell us a little bit about the process, like the first meeting that you went to.

MCGILL: Well Alice Berry --

HELFAND: Tell us about the first meeting you went to.

MCGILL: That's the first meeting I went to. The boss told me they was organizing a union.

HELFAND: But happened when you got there?

MCGILL: I got there. I walked in. I sat down. And I asked for a card and I signed the card and I was accepted.

HELFAND: Were they surprised to see you there?

MCGILL: They didn't act surprised. But anyhow, back then you had to be voted on to be accepted. You made an application for membership and you was voting on whether they'd accept you or not. That was an old ALF habit. That was silly. I always thought that was silly. But we carried that on for a long time, even a little farther. When I went there as a business agent in '43, they still voted on the membership because if you'd ever scabbed, anybody that ever had anything that you've ever done against the union, you might be there -- somebody there had an objection to you belonging because you had not been -- something in your past life that -- that was their theory. It didn't make sense now. And it didn't make sense then, but that was the theory, that if you'd ever done anything scabbed or done anything against the union, you might 00:50:00not be accepted. Also, we had union shop agreements. If you weren't accepted to the union, you didn't have a job.

HELFAND: Now back in '33, what did you have -- do you remember what they might've had to do to get a charter so that they could actually --

MCGILL: Yeah, you had to have 25 members and five dollars.

HELFAND: Could you --

MCGILL: You had to have 25 members to make an appilcationfor a charter and five dollars. And for years I couldn't get enough people to pay dues to hold a charter and I used to pay enough -- pay dues to hold a charter.

HELFAND: At Selma?

MCGILL: If I didn't get enough -- I had to go around and collect the dues every Friday as secretary and treasury, 25 cents a week. And if I didn't get enough quarters I paid it up so it'd hold a charter. It was hard to get people to pay dues. They'd come to the meeting, but they wouldn't pay the 00:51:00damn dues.

HELFAND: You once told me that they'd slip it in your pocket?

MCGILL: I kept in my apron pocket. We all wore big aprons in the mill to keep our clothes clean. That odor would spring out from the veneers. We wore aprons and we put waste in our aprons. And with big pockets, we'd put the waste in there, we'd get to the end of the frame and empty our pockets and put it in the waste basket. Except that waste and the sweepings off the floor and reworked, that's where all them burs come from.

HELFAND: And what about the quarters?

MCGILL: Dues money, every week, quarter a week.

HELFAND: Would they walk past your spinning frame and give it to you?

MCGILL: Yeah, uh-huh.

HELFAND: Could you describe that?

MCGILL: Well they'd just come by and give me the quarter and then later on I'd give them their receipt.

HELFAND: Were you public about all of this or were you private?

MCGILL: Well we didn't have to worry about it where I worked with Joe. He didn't bother. He didn't mess into our business. I don't know what they did on other floors. I didn't collect on other floors. The stewards had to collect down there and turn it in. But Joe never interfered in our union activity and we protected him to the part that we didn't do anything to embarass him because he was a fine man. In fact, he didn't testify at the board hearing. When he got on the stand, he said, "I can't -- I can't testify either way because I had no problem in my department."

HELFAND: Now what was the relationship --

MCGILL: I keep thinking of that old weave shop foreman. He fired that man, Robertson. He fired him and that's what caused the -- he filed charges. That Robertson guy, he filed charges against [Hillman?], that's why they had a board case.

HELFAND: Now what was the relationship -- you had a board case -- that was after the strike, wasn't it?

MCGILL: I think it was before. I can't remember. I can't remember, but it must've been after the strike because I remember -- let me think. You see I didn't last too long at the strike because I got into the Women's Trade Union League and, uh -- it had to be after the strike. It was in '33, we were off of the strike in '34. It had to be after the strike, they fired that 00:54:00Robertson guy. He was a troublemaker in our union too. He was a troublemaker in our union. He -- my best friend Maddie, he -- one night we was having a little social affair at the union hall and this Robertson came drunk to the meeting. And we had a strict rule, no drinking in the union hall. No one could come in there and drink. Well nobody said anything to him, but he brought -- this guy had a bunch of little trained dogs and he was going to introduce this guy to his trained. He kept talking. He kept talking. Finally I said, "Well brother Robertson, how about sitting down and let us see what the dogs can do instead of you telling us." And he got mad at me. Afterwards, he kept following me around the hall, pestering me, you know, arguing with me, and blah, blah, blah. So Maddie walked up and said, "I want you to leave her alone." He slapped her. He just slapped the fire out of her. So Maddie went and had 00:55:00him arrested. And that was one of the things I yelled for Jim Cower about. We went to court and nothing wouldn't have been said about the union if [Elverson Cower?] hadn't had brought it up. He was the attorney for this guy. He was also attorney for our local. I resented him representing a member against another member being hired by our local. I resented that in the first place. I didn't think he should've took a case, defended one against the other when they was both members and he was our union -- local union attorney. Although he didn't get paid much, he accepted it and was our attorney. And to represent one member against another, to me, was not the thing he should've done. It was a -- what you call now -- a conflict of interest I think. But nothing was 00:56:00said about why he slapped her, nothing in court, until he got up to defend him and he asked Maddie, "Isn't it a fact that this started -- I got so mad when he said it, I never will forget it. He said, "Isn't it a fact that this fight all started because of our argument between Miss McGill and Robertson about the ability of their organizers?"

HELFAND: About the ability of your organizers? These were your -- your -- your -- your volunteer organizers --

MCGILL: John Dean and Albert Cox. Our organizers, the two organizers, our paid representatives. He was running them down, you know, putting them down. He would've done it -- well they had the whole damn state. I don't know he could -- they couldn't stay over there with us, they had the whole state to look after. But he was always criticizing them and I was always holding up for them. I said, "We don't need them. We can run our own business." That's what we was arguing. He kept following me around. He was drunk. I 00:57:00think he thought he ought to be on the staff himself, you know, and he didn't have -- but anyway, Maddie said, "I want you to quit bothering her and leave her alone." And he just got fired over it.

HELFAND: Well let's -- you know --

M1: We're going to have to change tape.

HELFAND: We have to change tape?