ma.
I had a home on it. I lost it. We brought a suit for water damage. We
lost it, I reckon. They fixed a dam that ruined my place. I left and
went to the North--to Springfield, Ohio. I started public work and
worked three or four months in a piano factory. I liked farming the best
and come back to it. My boys hope me down hill. I got two boys. My girl
left me all I got now. She is dead. I got a home and twenty-five acres
of ground. She made the money washing, ironing and farming. I 'plied for
the old folks' pension but didn't get it and give it up. I made four
bales cotton, one hundred pounds seed cotton. My place is half mile from
town. I have to get somebody to do all the work.

"My father did vote. He voted a Republican ticket. I have voted but I
don't vote now. I voted a few days ago for a little cotton this year. It
was the cotton control election. I voted a Republican ticket. I found
out Democrat times is about the best time for us in the South. I
quit voting because I'm too old to keep up with it. If a woman owns
anything--land or house--she ought to be allowed to vote.

"The times is mighty hard. I need a little money now and I can't get it
nowhere. It looks like bad times for me. The young folks don't work hard
as I did. I kept study (steady) at farming. I liked it. My race is the
best fitted for farming and that is where we belong. I never been in
jail. I never been arrested in my whole life."

Interviewer's comment

I stopped this clean, feeble, old Negro--humble as could be--on the edge
of town. He had a basket of groceries taking to his old wife. It was a
small split basket. His taxes worried him. He couldn't get a holt on any
money, so I told him about the Farmers' Loan. He was so scared looking
I felt he didn't tell me all he knew. He looked tired. I gave it up and
jokingly asked him if he had ever been in jail. He said, "I never been
in jail. I never been arrested in my whole life." I laughed good and
thanked him. I told a young woman who had curiously been trying to catch
the conversation from her yard that I feared I frightened the old man
till he couldn't think to tell me all he knew. She said, "Maybe so but
he has a reputation of being good as gold and his word his bond."

Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Ky (Hezekiah) Steel
West Fifth Avenue (rear), Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 85
Occupation: Yard man

"What is it you want to know? Well, I was