es were used by those not able to afford candles.
Stockings were knitted by the women during cold or rainy weather.
Weaving and spinning done by special slave women who were too old to
work in the fields; others made the cloth into garments. Everything was
done by hand except the luxuries imported by the wealthy.

Duncan Gaines is now a widower and fast becoming infirm. He looks upon
this "new fangled" age with bare tolerance and feels that the happiest
age of mankind has passed with the discarding of the simple, old
fashioned way of doing things.

REFERENCE

1. Personal interview with Duncan Gaines, Second Street near Madison
Training School for Negroes, Madison, Florida

FEDERAL WRITERS' PROJECT
American Guide, (Negro Writers' Unit)

Rachel Austin, Secretary
Jacksonville, Florida
April 16, 1937

CLAYBORN GANTLING

Clayborn Gantling was born in Dawson, Georgia, Terrell County, January
20, 1848 on the plantation of Judge Williams.

Judge Williams owned 102 heads of slaves and was known to be "tolable
nice to 'em in some way and pretty rough on 'em in other ways" says Mr.
Gantling. "He would'nt gi' us no coffee, 'cept on Sunday Mornings when
we would have shorts or seconds of wheat, which is de leavins' of flour
at mills, yu' know, but we had plenty bacon, corn bread, taters and
peas.

"As a child I uster have to tote water to de old people on de farm and
tend de cows an' feed de sheep. Now, I can' say right 'zackly how things
wuz during slavery 'cause its been a long time ago but we had cotton and
corn fields and de hands plowed hard, picked cotton grabbled penders,
gathered peas and done all the other hard work to be done on de
plantations. I wuz not big 'nuff to do all of dem things but I seed
plenty of it done.

"Dey made lye soap on de farms and used indigo from wood for dye. We
niggers slept on hay piled on top of planks but de white folks had
better beds.

"I don't 'member my grandparents but my mas was called Harriet Williams
and my pa was called Henry Williams; dey wuz called Williams after my
master. My mas and pa worked very hard and got some beatings but I don't
know what for. Dey wuz all kinds of money, five and ten dollar bills,
and so on then, but I didn't ever see them with any.

"When war came along and Sherman came through the old people wuz very
skeered on account of the white owners but there was no fighting close
to me. My master's sons Leo and Fletcher joined the army and