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Interview with Johnnie W. Archie

June 17, 1994 Transcript of an Interview about Life in the Jim Crow South Birmingham (Ala.) Interviewer: Paul Ortiz ID: btvct02020 Interview Number: 151

SUGGESTED CITATION

Interview with Johnnie W. Archie (btvct02020), interviewed by Paul Ortiz, Birmingham (Ala.), June 17, 1994, Behind the Veil: Documenting African-American Life in the Jim Crow South Digital Collection, John Hope Franklin Research Center, Duke University Libraries. Behind the Veil: Documenting African-American Life in the Jim Crow South An oral history project to record and preserve the living memory of African American life during the age of legal segregation in the American South, from the 1890s to the 1950s. ORIGINAL PROJECT Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University (1993-1995)  

COLLECTION LOCATION & RESEARCH ASSISTANCE John Hope Franklin Research Center for African and African American History and Culture

at the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library

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Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University Behind the Veil: Documenting African American Life in the Jim Crow South Interview with JOHNNIE W. ARCHIE [DOB 11/10/09] Birmingham, AL June 17, 1994 Paul Ortiz,

Interviewer

Ortiz: Mr. Archie, I wonder if you could tell me a little bit

about when you were born and where you were born and then a

little bit about the community that you grew up in.

Archie: I was born in Wilcox County, 1909, on a place my daddy

bought a home, a little home, on 80 acres of land. I grew up

there, a place you call Lamison, Alabama. It was four boys and

two girls whole brothers and sisters. My daddy was married

before he was married to my mother. He had a boy and a girl by

his wife. My mother was married before she married him. Her

husband died, and she was the mother of a boy and a girl. So we

grew up in that family like that.

My daddy bought a home, 80 acres of land, in 1908. He paid

for it in 1908 or 1909, somewhere along there. I think he paid

for it the year I was born or the year before I was born. We

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would raise part of our own food. We raised chickens, turkeys,

guineas, hogs, and cows. We would pickle a cow, my daddy would

pickle a cow every year. He would kill enough hogs to last

practically all of the year.

My daddy was a railroad man. He worked for the Southern

Railroad Company, more in the Mobile Division. We raised our

foodstuff mostly. We raised corn, peas, sweet potatoes, sugar

cane, make our own syrup. We even raised rice. We would get a

big log, cut down a pine tree and cut it off about four or five

feet long, get a sharp instrument and you would dig a place in

that log about this deep, but it would be wide at the top and

narrow at the bottom. Sometimes we had to put fire up in there

and burn it, and we got something you would call a pipette. You

get you a piece of timber, cut it off about two or three foot

long, and you would trim it on the end, and you'd put that rice

down in there and you'd juke it like that with that we called a

pipette to get the husk out of it. After you do that so much,

you'd take the rice out and put you a old quilt or spread or

something down on the ground, hold it up, and the wind would

blow the husk out of the rice, so you'd have your rice and your

husk would be cleaned off. We'd make our own syrup.

So we had a good life. We didn't have no silver spoon in

our mouth, but didn't nobody have to advance my daddy. But a

whole lot of people that lived near us that, a man had a family,

he'd work for wages. He was making $120 a year, $10 a month. I

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don't see how he did it, but he did.

After I went to elementary school, I had to go a long ways

then to high school. I had to go from Lamison to Arlington to

go to high school. That was about eight miles. The last two

years that I was in high school I rode a bicycle from Lamison to

Annie Main [phonetic]. That was about seven or eight miles.

Southern Railroad train used to leave Flatwood. It's three

miles from Flatwood to Lamison, five miles from Lamison to

Arlington. Some mornings when the train would leave Flatwood

and broke across, and I'd leave Lamison. The train run eight

miles. I'd been rode five miles on wheels. That was going.

And it wasn't no asphalt road. Gravel road.

So I come up, I didn't have a silver spoon in my mouth. It

was kind of rough back then. I started to work before I was of

age. I starting working about fourteen, fifteen years of age.

We'd lay by our crops. I'd go to the mill, [unclear] Silver

Lumber Company.

Ortiz: What town was that in?

Archie: That was in '25, '26, '27, 1926, 1927.

Ortiz: That was in Wilcox County?

Archie: In Wilcox County, yeah, Lamison, in Wilcox County.

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Ortiz: Do you remember when you were growing up your neighbors,

the community, what it was like, the friends you might have had

when you were growing up. Can you talk a little bit about that.

Archie: Yeah, we had friends, boys, girls, grew up. We didn't

fight and carry on like the children carry on now. Our

neighbors all felt like we were cousins or kinfolks, it seemed.

We treated one another like that. We was raised up with a

bunch of boys. A lady, Mrs. May Gaston [phonetic] had five or

six boys. There is six of us. Sam Moore had five or six boys.

Johnny Stalkman [phonetic] had four or five boys and girls.

Well, it was just a crew [unclear].

We raised cows. We'd milk four and five cows all through

the summer and spring. Some of those people didn't even have

cows. I remember one family, the Stalkman family, my mother

would churn every day about eleven o'clock. She had a boy named

Amos, a girl named Bamma [phonetic] and one named Lilly. One or

two of those kids would come to our house every day at churn

time and get a eight-pound bucket of milk. We used to get lard

in eight-pound buckets, and they'd take them buckets and wash

them and make them for milk buckets.

We grew up nice. We didn't have no silver spoon in our

mouth. Wages was cheap back then. When I started to work, I

started working for the Silver Lumber Company, I really don't

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know what the pay was right then and there. But after I got up

to be a boy of eighteen years of age, I started working for the

Southern Railroad. I think I was making $3.00 or $2.84, I

believe. That's what it was, $2.84. I worked six months and

got a raise.

Ortiz: How did you get that first job at Southern Railroad?

Archie: Well, I worked at the sawmill and planing mill before I

worked on the railroad. The sawmill burned down in 1928. Then

I went to the railroad. In fact, my daddy was working on the

railroad. He vouched for me.

Ortiz: Okay, so he helped you.

Archie: He helped me. It wasn't hard for me to get on the

railroad.

Ortiz: So he was working both on the railroad and farming.

Archie: Yeah. We run the farm.

Ortiz: So you had brothers and sisters who were helping out.

Archie: Yeah. I had four brothers older than me, and they were

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working different places, too. One was working at the mills,

and I had one brother, he went to the bridge gang. The one I'm

next to, Colin [phonetic], he worked on the bridge gang. After

the sawmill burned down in 1928, that's when I started working

on the railroad.

Ortiz: Did your family go to church in Wilcox County?

Archie: Did we? Oh, yeah.

Ortiz: Which church?

Archie: Mount Olive Primitive Baptist Church [phonetic]. My

daddy was the what they used to call the head deacon then. They

call it the chairman now of churches now. Yeah, Mount Olive.

Ortiz: Was church an important part of your life growing up?

Archie: Yeah.

Ortiz: What kinds of activities did you do in the church.

Archie: In the church? I didn't do anything back then when I

was young but just would attend church, sung in the choir, later

got to be the superintendent of Sunday school. That's all I did

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there at church.

At which I got cut off on the railroad, I went back to

build a mill then about fifteen miles from where I lived, build

a mill in Gaston, Alberta, the same company, F___ and S___. In

'33, '31, '32, I worked for them for ten hours, 50 cents a day.

I say 45 cents for five days and 50 cents for one, because it

was cutting 25 cents a week for insurance. You don't know

nothing about Roosevelt, do you, President Roosevelt? You heard

about it?

Ortiz: Yes.

Archie: Well, the day President Roosevelt was elected, I put

five stacks of 2 x 12s through a re-saw, through a machine, five

stacks of 2 x 12s for 50 cents a day. I made $12.00 a month,

take home $11.00, back in '32, '33, along in there. Well, when

that mill cut out--

Ortiz: What town was that mill in?

Archie: That was 1932 and '33, along in there.

Ortiz: Okay. And which town was that?

Archie: That was in Alberta where that mill was. Well, the

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same company was in Lamison, but they got burned down in '28.

In '31, '32, they moved to a place called Alberta, about fifteen

miles beyond me, and built back, and I worked for them there.

After--what happened? The sawmill got burned down there. I

don't know whether it's in '34 or '35. But anyway, I remember

'39, '38, '39, I went to Jackson, Alabama. That's about fifty

miles going toward Mobile. I worked for Smith Lumber Company.

Then I worked for Bell [phonetic] Lumber Company in Jackson,

Alabama. In the latter part of '39, I worked for Calvin

Construction Company on the highway. That's along the latter

part of '39 and '40. I worked back with Moss and Wilson Lumber

Company in '40 and the early part of '41.

Ortiz: What was it like working back then in those companies?

What were some of your experiences? [Telephone interruption.]

What was it like working for the different companies? What

were some of your experiences?

Archie: My duties?

Ortiz: What was it like to work there? You had moved from

Wilcox.

Archie: No, I still was at Wilcox. The way we were transported

from Lamison to Albert was to go on truck back and forth, and

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then after which I went to rooming and boarding in Alberta. I

kind of got scared to travel.

Ortiz: Why?

Archie: Something got to bothering me like. I don't know what

it was. One morning before that I had to leave home about four-

thirty to catch the truck about five o'clock. Going up the road

one morning, something like I don't know what it was. It wasn't

no wind blowing nowhere, and trees was on the side of the road.

It looked like a wind storm would be in like this tree

[unclear] house yonder. Get there, it would be in that. Just

looked like someone was up there shaking the limbs, the leaves

off, but it wouldn't be in but one tree. Leave that. I'd go,

you know, like trees on the side of the road, like from here to

Avenue [unclear], like that. That kind of stagnated me.

Later I had a new way I could go across and not hit the

public road. They had a new road we could go across. One

evening I got in. Five-thirty in the evening in the fall the

sun is about down. We get off five-thirty and ride fifteen

miles. I'd get out and walk a mile and a half. Going through

S___ Woods one evening one night I seen something there. I

don't know what it was. Whatever it was, it jumped. It was on

tree, stopped along where I was at. It was scratching, but

wasn't moving. I got juiced by that. I didn't know what in the

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world that was. I carried a gun. I fired at the thing. The

explosion of the gun, it made a reflection. I could see it look

like it fell off the tree, but it didn't make no noise and I

didn't hear no noise.

I went back along there the next morning or two, and I

heard a voice. Something called me. There was a graveyard

above where I was going. I don't whether nobody was up there or

not. They called me by my nickname. My nickname was Bubba. I

didn't say anything. I had made up my mind, if it called again,

I was going to answer. I got juiced and a little shake up. I

said, "Well, I ain't going to take any chances no more." That's

when I went to staying up to Alberta.

Well, along about--I don't know what year it was, but it

was after '34, '35, '34, '35, along there, but after which I

went to working on the highway, construction work, building

bridges, with Calvin Construction Company.

Ortiz: Did you always carry a rifle with you back in those

days?

Archie: No, I didn't. I carried a gun sometimes, pocket gun,

.38 sometimes, when I was going back and forth to work like

that. But just to carry it up and down the street or anything,

I didn't carry it. I carried it when I was going back and forth

to work sometimes.

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Ortiz: Was there any reason? Was it for protection that you

carried a gun?

Archie: That's what it was for, protect me for a while,

especially when I was leaving home before day and getting back

at night. It would be day when I leave and day when I come

back.

Ortiz: Were you thinking about self-defense?

Archie: Yeah. That's all it was for. That didn't last long,

because I didn't travel like that too long. I went to boarding

after all that things shook me up. That's the reason I went to

carrying it. I got shook up. I didn't know what that was. I

didn't know whether it was somebody in there trying to harass me

or what it was. So to keep from getting in trouble, if it was,

I decided I'd just go to boarding, and that's what I did.

Ortiz: Was there any kind of racial violence in Wilcox County?

Archie: No, no, there wasn't no violence. It wasn't no racial

violence during them years. Hardly ever you would hear tell of

any kind of thing breaking out. Far as family relationship, we

didn't have no kind of violence between families back then.

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People got along like they were sisters and brothers. What my

daddy and mother had, like we'd kill hogs, kill a beef, anything

like that, they'd divide it with the neighbors. Greens, teas,

and things like that we raised, they'd divide it with the

neighbors. You're going to have some lazy folks, I don't care

where you go and how you do. We didn't have a silver spoon in

our mouth, but my daddy taught us to work. We always had

something to share, always had something to share.

So after working on this railroad in 1939 and '40, I got

tired of this concrete building bridges and things and working

on [unclear]. So that work had got slow anyway, and I started

back working at the mill, and me and one little boy used to

stack every bit of the lumber the mill cut, about thirty-five

and forty-five feet of lumber a day, thirty-five, sometimes

forty-five. Me and one fellow would stack all of that. They

wasn't pay us nothing. Two dollars, I think, or $2.75. We

asked for a raise. I asked them to give that as a contract. We

were stacking it, putting it all through the dry kiln.

So I told my buddy, "I'm tired of this. They don't want to

give us a raise and don't want to like do nothing for us. I'm

going to Birmingham." That was on a Saturday evening I told him

that, Friday evening or Saturday. Friday made it up, Thursday

and Friday, or something like that. We worked Saturday, and I

said, "I'm going to Birmingham in the morning."

A train was running thirty-thirty coming to Selma and five-

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thirty going to Mobile. I boarded the train to come to

Birmingham in 1941 in March. He boarded a train that next

evening going to Mobile. So they had to get about eight men to

stack that lumber after we were gone.

Ortiz: To replace two of you.

Archie: Just two of us was doing it. So they had to put it out

on the yard, made a yard out there. Then they stack it and let

it air dry. So I came here in '41.

Ortiz: Did you have other family or friends that had went to

Birmingham before you did?

Archie: Yeah. I had a brother-in-law and a nephew was working

for Republic Steel. I come here. I had a nephew who was a good

ball player, and I was a pretty good ball player. They were

scouting for ball players, and that's how I got the job here.

Ortiz: At Republic Steel?

Archie: At Republic Steel, yeah. My nephew was playing with

the Thomas Company [phonetic], and I played in the city league

for a year and a half or two years, in '41 and part of '42. I

worked here then.

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I got hurt in [unclear] one evening. A fellow blocked the

base and made me fall and I hurt my hand and head. I popped up

a ball. It went straight up in the there. I never popped a

ball like this. When the ball hit the ground, I was in second

base, that's just how high the ball went in the air. A fellow

was mean. It looked like he tried to spike me going in third

base. I said, "Well, it's time for me to quit." I quit playing

ball in '42.

Before I come to Birmingham in '41, it must have been '39,

because I come to Birmingham in March of '41, and in '39 I

pitched a game of ball against Muddy Wood in '39.

Ortiz: Against who?

Archie: Muddy Wood. That's the name of the other team, Muddy

Wood, in '39. We win that game. Then I come here, and I've

been here ever since. I've been here since '41. I got a job at

Republic Steel. It happened the labor foreman down here, he

used to work for Southern Railroad out the Rome, Georgia,

division, out of Anniston, going toward Rome, Georgia. I worked

over there a while after I got cut off at home and I bumped to

on the Rome, Georgia, division and worked there for a while.

Come a hold, the yardmaster who was over there was the [unclear]

here when I come here. So he asked my nephew, when he carried

my name down, he told my nephew, "Yeah, tell him to come." He

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hadn't forgotten me. So when I walked in the personnel office

that morning down in the labor department office, he told the

personnel man to hire me. So when I went to the labor

department that morning, he spoke when I spoke. "I think I know

you."

He said, "I know you."

I said, "Where do you know me from?"

He laughed. I said, "I know where. You're name is Mr.

Simms. You was the yardmaster over in the Rome, Georgia,

division."

So I've been working here. I worked here ever since then.

I started to work here on the 23rd day of March 1941. I worked

thirty-two years and ten months and six days. I was late one

time during that time. I had to go to a trial. I called the

foreman and told him, "They hadn't called for me yet."

He said, "Well, when you get out, you come in." It was

about four-thirty when I got here.

I retired 31st January in '73. I was off during that time

one day for illness. I strained a muscle around my heart one

morning pushing on a ladder. I come by the doctor's office and

told me that's what I did. I got ready to go back to work that

night. I was working eleven to seven. I had a chill. I had my

wife report me off. The next day I went on back to work, and

that's the time I lose. Thirty-two years and ten months and six

days is what I put over at Republic Steel. I ain't did nothing

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but work hard all my days. Treated everybody do respect.

Ortiz: What was it like going from Wilcox County to Birmingham

in 1941? Was it a big change for you as a young man moving to

Birmingham?

Archie: Yes, it was a big change. I had got tired of working

for nothing. Then I had got tired of working piece jobs, work a

while, eight or ten months, five or six months here, and then

cut out. I was on my way to West Virginia, but I didn't want to

mine. My brother was working in the mine, and my nephew was

working for this company. He was ball playing. They were

scouting for ball players. I was a pretty good ball player, and

that's what helped me get a job here, and so I stopped here. I

stayed here.

That's why I come. I got tired of that. I still got a

home down there now. I was down home Wednesday. I got eighty

acres of land there my daddy left. A fellow tried to buy it. I

told him it ain't for sale. Eighty acres of land there. What's

a name, [unclear] men were going in there, and them four-wheel

drive kept the road all messed up. I put up some posted signs

there this past October.

Ortiz: What part of Birmingham did you live in?

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Archie: Right here.

Ortiz: Right here. In this area.

Archie: Right here, in this house.

Ortiz: In this house?

Archie: I stayed in this house from August of '41. I moved my

family here December 7th, the day they bombed Pearl Harbor. I

had three girls and five boys, raised them right here. Put them

all through school. Didn't have but one went to college.

Ortiz: What was this area, this neighborhood like in 1941? Who

lived here? Was this mainly African-American people that lived

in this area?

Archie: Yes. From this street back here, 3rd Street back this

way back to 9th Street was all colored people. From 3rd Street

back that way, they were a white settlement. Now, all them

houses right down across the avenue--

Ortiz: Across Florida Avenue?

Archie: Across Florida Avenue were built since I was here.

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That house there was built since I've been here. That house

over there was built since I've been here. The rest of these

houses, from here back to 9th Street, was company houses years

ago. They sold them to the employees back in somewhere in the

fifties or sixties somewhere. I can't remember exactly what

year it was. It had to be in the fifties. Yeah, fifty-

something, because them was built down there in the sixties. In

fifty-something when they sold them. The company sold them to

the employees.

Ortiz: Republic Steel?

Archie: Yes.

Ortiz: What was it like to live here? You said it was

basically a company town.

Archie: Yeah, company house.

Ortiz: Company housing. What was it like?

Archie: You mean the neighborhood?

Ortiz: Yes, the neighborhood. Where did you go shopping?

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Archie: You'd go to town to shop, go to Birmingham to shop.

The company had a big store, something they called the

commissary. We would buy goods, buy food from the company

store. They had something like doogaloo [phonetic]. You could

get a order, say you go to the office, and you check out

whatever you want to check out and you spend it like you do

money, but it was company doogaloo. They called it doogaloo.

You have quarters, dimes, and half-dollars and things. I don't

know what that stuff was or name on that thing, but you couldn't

spend it nowhere but with the company.

Ortiz: Like scrip.

Archie: Yeah, like scrip. That's what it was, scrip. Some

called it scrip and some called it doogaloo. I would buy three

sets of clothes a year. I'd buy for Christmas, Easter, and

September for schooltime. Like I buy for Christmas, by Easter

I'd be paid that out just about. They cut me so much a month.

Sometimes I'd buy $600, $700, $800, $900 worth of clothes.

Clothes and things weren't selling like they sell now.

But that's the way I schooled my children, buy their school

clothes, buy for Christmas for them, and buy for Easter for

them. Well, Christmastime I'd be about paid it out before

Easter. By Eastertime, I'd be about paid that out before

schooltime. But they would cut me so much per month, a

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estimate. We had estimates. Pay off on the 4th and 19th. We'd

estimate [unclear]. That's the way I paid for my children's

clothes.

Then the company allowed me to--all down here, you see them

houses down there? I used to raise peas and beans, corn down

here. Across that road over there where you come in, that where

I learned my children how to work. I raised peanuts, sweet

potatoes, peas, and beans there.

Folks did me bad, did me bad there. I had eighteen rows of

corn go down from this 4th Street. That's 5th Street down here,

and 5th Street goes across the railroad down here, like the

railroad cross up there. I had eighteen rows of corn. I had

bought me a horse and a rein. I rode over the field one evening

to see how it looked. Got over there and somebody had done

pulled eighteen rows of that corn, pulled it all, and had got

all the pods but two. I come back home and got my double-barrel

shotgun and went and set on a stump between them two pods, my

good mind and bad mind wrestling, warfaring. I was going to

shoot anybody who come pick up that corn. I had three girls,

five boys to take care and raise, and they did me like that.

But my good mind overruled. I throwed the gun on my shoulder.

The whistle blow at twelve o'clock at night, eleven o'clock, and

come on to the house.

Another time I had some shoats over there on that old road.

That was a old road then. It wasn't nobody traveling. I had

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five shoats, and somebody was trying to take out. Several

fellows had hog pens over there. Somebody went to taking them,

and we took time out at night and watched.

One night I was laying under a poplar tree. A guy walked

up to the pen. I had five shoats in there. He raised up his

feet. I had made a platform for my children could put feed over

in the thing. He raised up his feet to put over in the pen,

raised up like this. Instead of putting it over in the pen, he

took it down, put it [unclear]. I thumb-cocked a .38 Colt. He

put his foot down and walked away.

I met my buddy across the thing there. I don't know

whether it was on a Thursday night or Friday night. But anyway,

Saturday morning or Monday morning, I don't remember which, I

backed my truck up. I had a little truck. I backed it up and

put all five of them on there and carried them to the packing

house. I said, "If I got anything I'm going to get in trouble

by, I don't want it." To keep from getting trouble, I went and

sold them.

I had a milk cow. I had a little bull. I raised him. I

learned him how to plow. Folks used to come off the road and

make pictures of me. I learned my children how to work. Ain't

none of my kids lazy. All of them work. That's how I raised my

children. They thought I was mean to them by learning them how

to work, but I know they weren't going to be on my shoulders

always.

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So I went through it rough. I was treated bad in a way

here, but thank God I made it. I had another field where

somebody went over there and shelled the corn over there, sat

over there and pulled it and shelled it.

I worked hard here. I used to work at night, three to

eleven, or work at seven o'clock, get off three o'clock, go

right back at eleven to seven.

Ortiz: What kind of job were you doing at Republic Steel?

Archie: Well, I first started working on the railroad. I

worked on the railroad for a while in the yard. Then I went to

work track walking at night, putting the engines and the cars on

the track when they'd get off. I did that for about three

years.

For '44, '45, '44 I believe it was, I went to the

[unclear], where they make coke, coke ovens. I started working

on the coke oven around '45 or '47, somewhere along there,

worked hard at it. I wanted a job where they didn't lay off,

where it didn't get too cold and didn't get too hot, and that's

where I got a job at. I worked on the coke oven twenty-six

years. When I retired, I retired from the coke oven. I worked

everywhere around there. I worked the mud mill, I worked the

coal handling, I worked loot [phonetic], lead. Then I retired a

ladderman. I was a ladderman when I left.

Archie -

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Ortiz: When you were working in the railroad yard, you said

that the engines would--

Archie: Get off the track.

Ortiz: How would you get them back on the track?

Archie: With re-railers and wood, stuff like that, build up.

Ortiz: How many people were on that job, would be on that?

Archie: On that, a track walker?

Ortiz: Yes.

Archie: Me only. Then the switchmen and the conductors and the

firemen would get down and help me if I had to have a tie. See,

we had some re-railers, called a re-railer. Just like the train

jumped the track on this side, they had something that had flaps

in it, horns about this big, this long. It start a little down

here and then raise up. When it get up to the top of it like

[unclear], it would slip off along down the rail. You'd have

one on each side, and you'd spike them down where they wouldn't

slip to the tie. Get in there and put steam to it to get a

Archie -

24

little engine and pull them up. This wheel would drop on. The

other one come on and drop on. It was funny to do, but it was I

dug out ice and snow and everything, got down on the ground to

put them re-railers down.

I seen my death two times up there. They had a sinter

plant near to make that sinter, 75, maybe 85, sometimes 90

percent iron. They burn coal dust, pyrite, and what all they

didn't mix in that thing. But when it go through that process

of heat, it would come out pyrite [unclear]. They had five or

six different mixes they put in there. When it'd go in there,

it would go in there like powder. But when it come out, it

would be sinter. Go through the process of heat, burn it, and

when it come out, it would come out the process of iron, like

75, 85 percent iron.

I was putting on a car of that one night down on across the

re-railer. My maul was hitting the button. Well, you didn't

have much space to drive a spike. Sometimes my maul would be

hitting the top of the car. Got the re-railer put down, wait

till the engine come, and the door broke down right where I was

sitting across the rail. It would have mashed me flatter than

this thing, about 75 or 80 or 90 tons in the car.

Another night I was putting on car flue dust. That come

out of them furnaces when they dust them furnaces, that dust

would come. It would red-hot. I was putting on a car of that

one night, the door broke down. The furnace had blowed threw

Archie -

25

and blowed coke breeze out in the yard. That stuff was so hot,

it'll run on the ground just like [unclear]. I run, and what

saved me was, I jumped across the railroad, railroad track.

When it got to the railroad track, it just run up and couldn't

jump over it and piled up against the railroad track and spread

like that.

Another evening I was putting on a car. They got rock down

there that was put in there to make iron. Line rock, I guess

that's what it was. I was putting on a car of that one evening.

Put the re-railer down and waiting for the engine to come give

me a pull. The door broke down there. I was standing looking.

My [unclear]. I left the transportation department. That's

what made me leave and come to Republic.

I have taken one man and put in the stock rail at night.

Go to the rail up high, 39-foot rail. It weighed about 110

pounds to the foot. I have took one man and with the rail up

high, and I put a rail on the pushcart and go put ten with one

man help.

Boy, I've done some hard work in my life. But I got

pleasure out of doing it then. I had to work. That byproduct

was hot that you'd have, to get back you'd have to put on wooden

shoes on the bottom of your shoes to stay on top of that coke

oven. You had to wear wooden shoes. And then when them drags

would come out, I worked on the front for years. When them drag

would come out, you'd push that coke out of there sometimes that

Archie -

26

drags would be that high. I don't see how I did it.

I started to quit. I told the man one day, "I've gone as

far as I can go." They didn't want you to throw it on the

ground. They wanted you to throw it all back in the oven. I

was throwing some back in the oven. It burned the shovel. It

got so crumped up, I had to hit it down on the concrete to

straighten it out and then let it sit there a while to cool.

One day the foreman told me--I was throwing it on the

ground. He said, "The boss don't want you to throw it. Don't

throw no more of that one the ground."

When you get hot, you get mad. I said, "It's too hot for

the boss to sit in the office without a fan. If he was here,

I'd throw it in his lap." I kept throwing it on the ground.

I went up to the thing and told the man, "You can get me

out because I'm through. This [unclear] coal gets stand up, and

you know how bad it stands up."

He said, "Go out there and cool off. Go out and sit down."

I said, "I'm through. You can get me an out card." I was

mad and dissatisfied.

He come back when I cooled off, and he said, "Let me talk

to you. I want to talk to you. I know it's rough. It ain't

going to be like this always. These ovens ain't going to tear

up like this all the time. You got a family. I know you can

get another job. I believe you can get another job. But you

think what would it cost you--

Archie -

27

[Begin Tape 1, Side 2]

Archie: And I paid attention to what he said. I got to

thinking, "Yeah, I could get another job somewhere. I had done

been employed on the railroad." I got to thinking, you got to

get up and you got to transport and so forth and so on.

My children, I had five kids in school. I could get a book

of tickets for I don't know. But anyway, streetcar fare was 7

cents from here to town, but going to school you got a little

deduction by buying school tickets. I don't remember what them

school tickets was, but it was less than 14 cents per day. It

was less than 14 cents per day for the children to ride to

school if you got school tickets. So I'd buy a book of tickets.

They would last, I don't know whether them things last a week

or a month, I don't know. I just remember how long they would

last. It was rough.

Ortiz: On the jobs that you were working on, when you were

doing re-railing working at the coke ovens, were you primarily

working with other black workers?

Archie: Yeah. Yeah. All of them was black but the patcher and

the foreman. The patcher and the patcher helpers were white.

The foreman was white. The laddermen, well, the pusher was

Archie -

28

white at the time. The looters, the laddermen were all colored

up until a period of time, up until after the '65, after the

civil rights come in.

After the civil rights come in, we belongs to the CIO

union. If a job come open, if you had the age, you could apply

for it. So that started us running the pusher and the door

machine. Well, the door machine was a colored all the time, but

the pusher was white. Door cleaners was colored until a period

of time. After civil rights come in, then we could apply for

the up job, machine job. Before civil rights come in, we didn't

have no machine jobs. We weren't allowed on the machines. I

learned how to operate a machine by my buddy was a white guy.

He lived back here behind me, and me and him was working the

door machine together. I was on the floor throwing in the drags

and knocking the [unclear] door where he could lift. Then I

learned to--I'd go up there and watch him do a control, and I

learned how to push. But we, as colored folk, was allowed on

the machines. When it come time for us to bump and go to the

machine with our ages, we knew how to operate it. They didn't

have to [unclear] us.

So a white foreman called me one night to come out to run

the hot car. Somebody left. He said, "I can't tell you nothing

to do but the [unclear]. All I can tell you." That was

something, a machine that you caught the coke, have to push it

out [unclear] put it out.

Archie -

29

I worked everywhere there. I worked the mud mill, looting

, door machine, pusher, ladderman, screener, and all like that.

Ortiz: What did the leadmen do?

Archie: Leadmen? That's the machinery that would go to the top

house and get the coal. It had four hoppers. Each one of them

hoppers would hold 13 tons or 14 tons, something like that. No,

it didn't. It wasn't that much. That's what would come out

when it pushed the thing out.

How many tons did that thing hold? Well, you can divide 4

by 14 tons. It'll push out about 14 tons coke, and then we had

four hoppers. That was a thing made on the coke oven. It had a

[unclear] like this thing, made like this. When the ladderman

pulled the coal out, we'd have to be there to sweep the coal in

and then put the lid on. Then you had mud and loot and make up

a solution of mud, make it up out of water and coal and so forth

to pour around in them cracks to keep the smoking. We did them

machines, them dole things. They dilute them doles with mud.

Before it dried good, you had a thing on a long handle made this

way. You go down [unclear]. Oh, yeah, I went through it rough.

Ortiz: You mentioned the CIO union.

Archie: Yeah.

Archie -

30

Ortiz: What union was that?

Archie: That's CIO. That was the union. That's the name of

it.

Ortiz: Was that the United Steelworkers?

Archie: Yeah, that's what it was. CIO, that was the first name

of it, after which they brought in the United Steelworkers. But

I think that's the real name of it, United Steelworkers of

America.

Ortiz: What year did you join that?

Archie: In '42, I believe, or '43. '42 or '43, somewhere along

there. We had to do that, trying to get organized, you had to

do that on the QT, because the company find out you was trying

to help out on that thing, they wanted to fire you. Our

president, he was an engineer man, and our vice president, he

worked at the BP building. I carried notes to the president

many times, being a track walker. I carried notes many times.

They slipped me notes many times to carry to the president.

Ortiz: So you were in a key position.

Archie -

31

Archie: Yeah.

Ortiz: What kind of notes would you carry?

Archie: I don't know what would be on them a lot of time. He'd

tell what the meeting, what the business was. I wouldn't read

the notes. It would be union business. I would be union

business, that's what it would be. It said where they were

going to meet at before they got organized. That was when they

were getting set up, before they got organized.

Ortiz: Would you pass the notes to the other members, to the

other workers?

Archie: No, I'd take them to the president, from the vice

president sometimes to the president, like that, secretary and

so forth and so on.

Ortiz: Where were they at?

Archie: They'd be on their jobs. The president was working at

the BP building, the president was an engineer man, and the

secretary, he worked at the power house. I had some spare time

sometimes. See, track walker, in the evening time I would clean

Archie -

32

around the switches and clean them out and kept them oiled.

When it would get dark, I wouldn't have nothing to do but wait

until some of them get off. Have a wreck, some of them hot

parts get off the track or a car get off the track, they'd call

for me. I'd be at the roundhouse until then. They made three

calls, and I'd know where to go. I'd hear them. I'd know where

they were.

Ortiz: Three calls?

Archie: Yeah, on a whistle. Just like the train'd get off,

he'd blow three times. I don't know what to do. That was my

signal. I had to go then.

Ortiz: Go where?

Archie: Go where he was. If he was on the track, if he's in

the north yard or whether he's down on the frisco [phonetic],

wherever he was, he'd get off the track, he'd blow three blows.

Ortiz: That was the president?

Archie: No. Yeah, that was him. Sometimes it'd be him. But

what I'm saying, my job was, when them trains and them cars,

them hot cars would get off the track, well, the train had to

Archie -

33

carry the hot cars, the iron from the furnaces to the pig

machines. Sometimes they'd get off track. Well, that's when

they'd call for me. Three blows and I'd know where they was. I

had to go running then sometimes.

Yeah, it was rough. It was rough, but I made it. I

enjoyed working while I was working. I wasn't no lazy man no

way. When I'd go on a job, I'd go on the job to do my work. I

didn't go on the job to lay down. I unloaded more coal in eight

hours than any man had been with the company.

Then I didn't know what the setup was. One day I could

unload another car. I unloaded twenty-four cars in eight hours.

They had been unloading twenty, sometimes twenty-one, twenty-

two. Had nobody ever unloaded twenty-four cars. I'm the only

man that unloaded twenty-four cars at the coal mill. They

loaded twenty-one, nineteen, twenty-one, and twenty-two. Had

nobody got up to twenty-three.

I didn't know that they was checking that. So the guy

happened to say, "You got time to unload another car."

I said, "I ain't going to do it. I unloaded twenty-four

cars." I would have did it, but the bin was running over. I

said, "Where can I put it? I got time, but the bin's running

over." That kept me from unloading twenty-five cars. The bin

was running over, couldn't hold it, flagged me down.

Ortiz: I want to ask you just a couple more questions about the

Archie -

34

union organizing. One question, do you remember the names of

the--you mentioned the president and the treasurer. Do you

remember their names?

Archie: Mr. Anderson was the first president. Mr. Anderson.

What was his first name? I don't know if it was Roy Anderson,

but I know that was his last name. He's got a son lives right

over here on the road, right below the [unclear] area there, the

second house to the right. What his first name was, I don't

know. And Emmett Robertson [phonetic] was secretary when they

were getting organized.

Ortiz: Were they black?

Archie: No, they were white.

Ortiz: How did you get black and white workers to cooperate and

work together?

Archie: Well, they worked together, they were like team work.

See, you take at the coke oven we had a white foreman and a

white heater. You had a white pusher. You had a white quincy

[phonetic] carman. The ladderman was a colored, the l____ was a

colored, the door cleaner was a colored, and the door machine

was colored. The patcher was white. The patcher helper was

Archie -

35

white. But we all worked together just like we wasn't any.

There was no discrimination. We didn't have a bit of

discrimination at all.

Ortiz: So when you started organizing--

Archie: Organizing, they all come together. They wasn't no

split. Negroes and the white folks come together as one body.

Wasn't no discrimination. We had some of them scared, but we

had enough that wasn't scared that would bring them in what was

scared. So as we got organized, we got our charter and

everything, it was a good place to work. But beforehand, it was

pretty rough, before we got organized.

Ortiz: So you were able to improve the conditions.

Archie: Yeah, the union did improve the conditions. It wasn't

no discrimination amongst the white and the colored when they

were working, and after they got organized, it wasn't no

discrimination, because when a job would become available--now,

they discriminated against me once.

I was on the railroad and a switchman job come open. When

somebody wouldn't report to work, I'd have to switch extra.

They hired a fellow from the commissary, put him. He didn't

know a lining bar from a crowbar. But see, I had a family. I

Archie -

36

had to work. So when we went before the superintendent, he

asked me why didn't I make known to him. I said, "I carried it

to the representative. That's as far as I know to carry it."

But they treated me lowdown and dirty. I was already an

experienced fireman. Then I had learned how to switch when

somebody would be off. Favoritism, that's what did it. But

see, what it was, I didn't do too much discrimination because I

had a family to work for. See what I'm saying? But you see,

young then, I didn't know like I know up on up in the what's-a-

name. If I know like I had knowed up in the what's-a-name, it'd

been a different story. You had to learn it. Anything you get,

you got to learn it.

Ortiz: What was you union local number?

Archie: 2382 CIO. I won't ever forget that. My badge number

was 270. I won't ever forget them two things.

Ortiz: Your membership number?

Archie: I remember my number. 270 was my number, badge number.

That's what I had to go punch my clock, 270. I was late one

time--I had to go to a trial then--in them thirty-two years and

ten months and six days. I had to go to a trial then. I didn't

lay off. I think I lost two days when my mother passed back in

Archie -

37

'50. I had to go bury her.

Ortiz: Moving away from work a little bit, can you tell me

about when and where you met your wife.

Archie: Yeah. My mother and I was raised not far apart. We

went to school together. We went to elementary school together,

me and my wife did.

Ortiz: When did you get married?

Archie: In '34.

Ortiz: Did you go to Birmingham by yourself first to look for

work?

Archie: Yeah. Yeah, I come by myself. I had a brother-in-law

that lived on 5th Street and a nephew lived on 5th Street. I

come to my brother-in-law's house when I come here to go to

work. I come here on a Sunday morning. The train got here

Sunday evening. I wasn't here but a few days before I went to

work.

Ortiz: When did the rest of your family come up to Birmingham?

Archie -

38

Archie: Well, my oldest boy, I went and got him in '41 in

September to put him in high school in '41.

Ortiz: Which high school?

Archie: Parker. December 7th, I went and got my family,

brought my family here, right here in this house, and we've been

living here ever since.

Ortiz: What kind of school was Parker?

Archie: Parker was a high school. It was a high school. It's

there now. All my kids finished high school at Parker.

Ortiz: What did you think about Parker?

Archie: Parker is a good school.

Ortiz: Good school.

Archie: It was. From what I hear now, it still is, but quite

naturally these schools now ain't what they used to be, because

the children done got so rebellious now. The children didn't

carry knives and pistols to school back then, hardly ever. You

did have a few fights, but they'd be fist fights, because my

Archie -

39

boys got in a fight one time on the bus. They got in a fight

one time, but it wasn't no gun fight. It was a fist fight.

Ortiz: On the bus?

Archie: Yeah, on the streetcar. Was it a streetcar then or a

bus? I don't know whether it was a bus or streetcar. I think

it was a bus.

Ortiz: Do you know what caused the fight?

Archie: No. I don't know what caused the fight, it's been so

long. It's been so long. I don't know what caused the fight.

But they had left school. They wasn't at school.

I had to carry one of my kids back to school over Jackson

Olan [phonetic]. That's over in Ensly. My boy was taking a

trade to brick mason. I had to carry him back to school one

day. He got in a fight. A fellow had been playing at him and

calling him a sissy, and he asked him to leave him off. He went

to the principal and told the principal the boy was calling him

names and was trying to feel over him, and he wouldn't allow him

to do that. And finally, he hit him upside the head with a

ruler or something, but anyway he split his head, the side of

his face. So the principal sent him home, and I had to carry

him back.

Archie -

40

So I went back that morning and I asked him did he know

what happened. "You got my boy's story. Did you get the other

boy's story?" He hadn't got the other boy's story.

I had taught my kids, I don't care who else you lie to,

don't lie to me. Tell me the truth, whatever it is. So I asked

this boy what happened in front of the superintendent.

Then I asked the superintendent, "Did he come to you

sometime back on such and such a day and such and such a time?"

I gave him the same date and what time. The boy told me what

time and the date. I said, "He come told me this and thus and

so. Did he tell you that such and such a time?"

He remembered it. I said, "Well, why didn't you check this

other boy and find out what the story was before you sent him

home?" So he begged me pardon. See what I'm saying? "So I

upholding the wrong. I'm for right. But I don't think you

treated him right or me either." So that blowed over. It

wasn't nothing to it. It blowed over.

So they have got in little fights around here, the boys

have. I got one boy, he didn't pick no fights, but he's very

peculiar. He'd play a while, and when he'd get tired of

playing, he had a little rocking chair and he'd come get on the

porch and rock and go to sleep. Some of them go there and

bother him, then you had a fight. I couldn't fault him for that

in a way.

Another boy was playing at him and wanted to feel over him

Archie -

41

and calling him a sissy and so forth like that. He didn't go

for that. They got to fighting over there on the road one

Christmas. They was skating. He had to go to the doctor, the

boy did. So the boy's daddy and I worked for the company. He

worked on the furnace and I worked on the coke oven. He come

around. He asked about how it was. I told him, "I don't know

how it was. I can tell you what my boy said. I wasn't there."

I asked, "What did your boy say or what did he tell?" He said

something different, so I called my boy, "Come here. Mr. Evans

here said he wants to know how that fight come up or how it

started." So he told me what he told him. The boy nicknamed

him, called him a sissy and wanted to feel over him, and he

wouldn't allow it. He told him to go ahead and he wouldn't

quit, so he just boogered him up.

Ortiz: What would you do for recreation after work?

Archie: I didn't have no recreation then. I would come in, and

if I was working day shift, I'd go to the field. I had me a

field back across the railroad there over there by that Catholic

church. I didn't have no recreation. I didn't have nothing but

the work to try to raise my children, try to raise foodstuff for

them in the early years.

But in the later years, I'd fish and hunt. I can show you

that deer here that I got mounted right there, and there are

Archie -

42

fish I got there. In the later years, from '65, '60, '65, back

this way, that's what I would do. After my children got up and

got them through school, I'd hunt and fish. That was my hobby.

Ortiz: Would you and your family ever go downtown around 4th

Avenue?

Archie: For recreation?

Ortiz: Yes.

Archie: No. No, I never did. After which the children would

go to some of the recreation places, but I never did. I didn't

ever have time to go to no recreation till up to the later

years.

Ortiz: Did your wife also work?

Archie: No, she didn't work. The three girls and five boys was

her job here at the house. She didn't work nowhere. I figured

she had a big job then just taking care of that family. It was

a big job. No, she didn't work.

Ortiz: Did you go to a church around here?

Archie -

43

Archie: Yeah. I'm assistant pastor at the church around there,

Mt. Hebron, 503 5th Street.

Ortiz: When did you start going there?

Archie: I joined there in October of 1941. I sung in the choir

there for thirty-nine years. I sung in the choir from '41 to

'77. That's a good while, wasn't it?

Ortiz: Now you're assistant pastor.

Archie: Yeah, at here, Mt. Hebron. Helped build two churches.

Ortiz: Which churches?

Archie: Helped build two. When we come here, the company had a

church there, and they gave it to the folks here. It was a wood

church. Tore it down and built a rock church, and cooperated in

'65, I believe, and built a new church in '80. We had fifteen

years, and we paid for it in eight years, less than eight years,

around $200,000 church.

Ortiz: You talked earlier about the civil rights. When the

Civil Rights Movement was going on in Birmingham, Dr. King, some

of the protests, what did you think about that event, the Civil

Archie -

44

Rights Movement?

Archie: I think it was necessary, although I didn't have any

parts of it. I didn't march, I didn't go to either one of the

demonstrations, because I was working all the time. But I think

it was a necessary thing, because we was treated like dogs,

Negroes was. We wasn't allowed to drink out of the same

fountains. You had to ride the back of the bus if you rode.

Well, certain hotels you could go to. You couldn't go to any

hotel you wanted to go to. You had a certain hotel that you

could go to. But these hotels was upkept, you couldn't go to

them. Your Negro wasn't allowed there.

In other words, I just tell you the truth, I think that all

had been happening from years ago, years back, because Negroes

were treated very brutus back then.

Ortiz: What about here in Thomas? Were there areas in this

area that were segregated?

Archie: No. No, they wasn't segregated, but they didn't mix

like they do now. The white didn't treat you then like they do

now. We always did treat them better than they treated us, all

the time down through the years. But since the civil rights

thing come about, it drawed the white and the Negro closer

together. So they still have their church, and we still have

Archie -

45

ours. They come to our church to vote, they come to our church

sometimes they have different meetings, what they call it,

participation meetings. They come there to have that. The

whites and the coloreds get along just like sisters and brothers

now.

Ortiz: They come to your church?

Archie: Yeah, they come. We have a few come for service, but

not too often.

Ortiz: What kinds of people? Retired steelworkers?

Archie: What, here?

Ortiz: Yes.

Archie: Yeah, most of them is retired. We got some people

moved in since the civil rights. All the way down this street

here, across Florida Avenue, well, they was here. A whole lot

of them was in here. Some of them moved in here in the sixties.

Ortiz: I wanted to ask you maybe a couple more questions about

your childhood that I did not ask earlier. One of the questions

is, do you remember your grandparents much, stories that they

Archie -

46

might have told you?

Archie: About their life or something?

Ortiz: About their life, about what it was like when they grew

up. Did they ever talk with you?

Archie: Not very much. I didn't remember nobody but my daddy's

mama and my mother's mama. I didn't know anything about my

granddaddy on my mother's side or all on my daddy's side.

My grandmother on my daddy's side, I heard her say that she

was shipped here from England. She got a whole lot of learning

from the--she didn't work in the fields. She stayed at the

master's house, took care of his house. That's the way she

learned how to read and write, at their house.

My mama's daddy, she was a half Indian. I heard her say

that. And my grandmama on my mama's side, she used to wash and

iron for the white people to make her living. My grandmama on

my daddy's side, I was very small when she died. I was big

enough every morning to make her coffee and, you know, help her

like that when she passed. My mother's mother lived a long

time. I used to go visit her and stay with her three and four

days, sometimes a week at a time, and I used to go with her to

get wood to make fire around the pot where she washed and ironed

for some white folks.

Archie -

47

That's all I know about my grandparents. I didn't know

anything too much about them other than that.

Ortiz: When you were growing up, if you got sick or got in bad

health, where would you go?

Archie: My aunt on my daddy's side, she was a midwife. Two of

them was. And my grandmama on my daddy's side was a midwife.

My mother got a good bunch of schooling.

We would get sick, we'd use home remedies. We had a

doctor. I got sick one time. In 1919, I had a brother who went

to the army and he come back and something broke out, a disease.

They called it the fluenza, and that spread all over the

country. I had the fluenza when I was about nine years old. I

got so weak, until one morning my mother had moved the bed from

back in the house. Didn't have nothing like no gas heat or

nothing like that. We had a fireplace. Moved up near the

fireplace. I went to get up one morning and fell across the

fireplace. She was in the kitchen. I don't know whether she

heard it or not, but anyway when she came around, my clothes was

caught and I was too weak to move. It hadn't been for her, I

would have burned up.

She knew a whole lot of home remedies. That's what we

knew, a lot of home remedies. When we'd have a bad cold, you'd

get some castor oil, get some lemons, make tea out of lemon, and

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48

give you a dose of castor oil. Get some powder, put it on a

flannel cloth and scorch this cloth, and if you had a chest

cold, put that flannel into your breast, tie a bib around it and

that flannel laid to your breast with powder on it.

Shuck, give you some turpentine, go on about your business.

Stick a nail in your foot or anything, get some turpentine and

pine tar and smoke it, and get the pine tar and put some

turpentine on, and go about your business. We didn't know

nothing about no lockjaw shots and going to the doctor for no

lockjaw shots. Stick a nail in your feet, get some turpentine,

go get some pine tar. You know what pine tar is?

Ortiz: No.

Archie: You know what a pine tree is, don't you?

Ortiz: Yes.

Archie: Well, you go get some of them leaves, all them pine

tar, and get you an old bucket or something that you could set a

fire and let it smoke, put some turpentine on it, hold that

place over that fire and over that smoke, and then go on about

your business.

Home remedies is what they knew. Holly bush tea and so

forth and so on. Worms for children, get some horehound candy.

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49

Turpentine, and then worms get choking kids. You know,

children would be full of worms back then. Get you turpentine

and mark from here down to his navel and then stick in

turpentine all around his navel, them worms is going to turn

loose. Yes, sir. Yeah, we didn't have no doctor much.

Had a doctor. A doctor told my mama when I was about

eighteen, seventeen years old, [unclear] stomach. He told her

if I didn't have it operated on, I wasn't going to live. I was

old enough to make decisions for myself. I wouldn't have no

operation. I couldn't digest nothing since I been here, as far

as that's concerned, but I lived through it. Home remedies,

that's what we did.

Now, look at all the mess there. That's cough syrup there.

That's [unclear]. That's when I have pains in my leg. Look

what I have, liniment, this here liniment, all kind of stuff.

Then I have a salve and everything. Look, here's some salve. I

had to get up and rub last night, legs hurting. I don't know

what it is, cramps. So it's one of those things. I've got a

doctor's prescription now. I went last year and got some pills.

I thought I had a symptom of sugar, but I didn't have no sugar.

Ortiz: What was medical care like when you moved here to

Thomas?

Archie: Well, we had a doctor's office, doctor down there on

Archie -

50

6th Street.

Ortiz: Company doctor?

Archie: Company doctor. You paid so much. I don't know

whether it was 75 cents a week or 50 cents a week or $1.25,

something like that, a month for doctor bill. You go there and

get what medicine you need, the doctor, whatever.

We had a good doctor. I had a boy got sick in school one

day, and they called the doctor. The doctor come and told them

the best thing is to get him to the hospital. He had acute

appendix. They got him to the doctor's. The doctor take him in

the room, had to cut him open, and the thing bust in his hand.

Yeah, you had a good doctor, Dr. Roundtree. He's one of the

best. Yeah, Dr. Roundtree was a good doctor.

Ortiz: He was a white doctor?

Archie: Yeah, he was. He was a white doctor. But what he told

you, you could put your bottom dollar on it.

Ortiz: And then you retired in 1973.

Archie: Right, January 31, 1973.

Archie -

51

Ortiz: How many more years did Republic Steel continue

operating?

Archie: After I retired?

Ortiz: Yes.

Archie: Oh, '82 or '85. For some reason, the year the furnaces

shut down, the pig machine shut down, the sinter plant shut

down. Then they eventually tore the furnaces down, but the

byproduct, the coke oven, they still operated until '82 or '85.

I believe it was '85. '82 or '85, I just can't remember. I

can find out just a minute if my son-in-law's at the house. I

can find out exactly what day did he come off on, what day did

they come on. [Dials telephone.]

[Speaking on telephone] Hey, how are you doing? Henry

there? Let me speak with him. Hey, I want to speak with Henry.

Yeah. What year did you all come off, the day the coke oven

shut down? '82? We're getting up some documents here. I

thought it was '82. Okay. What month was it, do you know? You

know what month? July 17th. Did they shut down then? Had done

pushed the last oven. July the what? July the 17th in '82.

Pushed the last oven July 15th of '82. Okay, thanks. You

worked two days on cleanup. Okay, July 17, '82. Okay, thank

you.

Archie -

52

The shut down July the 17th in '82. That was my son-in-

law. He worked there. He come off. I got him a job there. He

lived down in Thomas. He went to work there in '55. I got him

a job. He had a big family. What did he have? Nine boys, I

believe. As a matter of fact, he had nine boys and two girls,

or ten boys and two girls. Three of the children were born

after they got here. That's right, in '55. I got him a job

here in '55, and that was him I was talking to just now.

July 17th in '82 when the coke oven pushed out, but the

furnace and thing had been shut down way before then. They had

done tore them down.

Ortiz: Mr. Archie, this information will go with the tape that

we've made, and this is just basic like family kind of

information. Like on this first sheet--

[End of Interview]

[transcribed by TechniType]