Dee Neely Interview

Partial Transcript: DEE NEELY: And so are you ready for me to start talking about?

Segment Synopsis: Dee Neely discusses why African American mill workers wrote an anonymous letter to Washington, and the segregation and discrimination faced by African American workers in the mill.

Keywords: African-American mill workers; brown lung

Subjects: African Americans--Segregation; Cooleemee (N.C.); Letter writing; Racism; Wages; Working class African Americans

Partial Transcript: JUDITH HELFAND: Let's be, um, this-- since this letter is dated 1934, March 1934, at that point they were trying to put the textile code in place, it was in place.

Segment Synopsis: Dee Neely discusses mill housing and the jobs available to African American workers in the textile mill.

Keywords: African-American mill workers; mill villages

Subjects: Cooleemee (N.C.); Wages; Working class African Americans

Partial Transcript: JUDITH HELFAND: Now at the time that this letter was written, March 9, 1934, could you tell me, could you speak in the first person and tell me how old you were and sort of where you were?

Segment Synopsis: Dee Neely discusses his relationship with various members of the African American community in Cooleemee and what his thoughts about the letter and the strike were as a child.

Keywords: African-American mill workers

Subjects: African American churches; Cooleemee (N.C.); Textile Workers' Strike (Southern States : 1934); Textile workers; Wages; Working class African Americans

Partial Transcript: F1: What did y'all think of -- what did the folks over in North Cooleemee think of Roosevelt?

Segment Synopsis: Dee Neely discusses how Roosevelt, the unions, and the strike were perceived in the African American community in Cooleemee.

Keywords: African-American mill workers; African-American unions

Subjects: New Deal (1933-1939); Roosevelt, Franklin D. (Franklin Delano), 1882-1945; Textile Workers' Strike (Southern States : 1934); Textile workers--Labor unions

Partial Transcript: JUDITH HELFAND: So if you don't-- could we get back to this, this moment--

DEE NEELY: Oh yeah.

HELFAND: -- in time.

Segment Synopsis: Dee Neely discusses the jobs done by African Americans in the textile mill and what he remembers about the letter being written.

Keywords: African-American mill workers

Subjects: Minimum wage; Textile Workers' Strike (Southern States : 1934); Working class African Americans

Partial Transcript: JUDITH HELFAND: Now what, what gave this community so much unction, unction? Gumption, gumption? Yeah gumption. What gave them the courage to speak up like this?

Segment Synopsis: Dee Neely discusses they ways in which the African American community in Cooleemee fought for justice in the 1930s, and about how Roosevelt shifted voting patterns in both the working class African American and working class white communities.

Keywords: African-American mill workers

Subjects: Cooleemee (N.C.); Food; Radio programs; Roosevelt, Franklin D. (Franklin Delano), 1882-1945; Textile workers; Voting; Working class African Americans

Partial Transcript: DEE NEELY: Cooleemee North Carolina. March the 9th 1934. Honorable Hugh Johnson.

Segment Synopsis: Dee Neely discusses the letter that was written by African American mill workers to Hugh S. Johnson protesting the fact that they were not being cover by the National Recovery Act.

Keywords: African-American mill workers; National Recovery Administration

Subjects: Discrimination; Minimum wage; Strikes and lockouts--Textile industry; Textile workers; Wages; Working class African Americans

Partial Transcript: JUDITH HELFAND: Did, did you see the guards here did you see them camped here?

Segment Synopsis: Dee Neely discusses his memories of the textile workers' strike of 1934, his childhood during in segregation, and the domestic work that his mother did.

Keywords: domestic workers; mill villages

Subjects: African Americans--Segregation; Textile Workers' Strike (Southern States : 1934); Working class African Americans; Working class women

Partial Transcript: JUDITH HELFAND: Now was it hard to get a job there?

Segment Synopsis: Dee Neely discusses what it was like working in the textile mill for African Americans.

Keywords: African-American mill workers

Subjects: Textile workers; Wages; Working class African Americans

Partial Transcript: JUDITH HELFAND: Do have any pictures of these men?

Segment Synopsis: Dee Neely discusses why the African American community in Cooleemee is more willing to discuss the textile workers' strike of 1934 than the white community

Keywords: African-American mill workers

Subjects: Cooleemee (N.C.); Photographs; Textile workers