a cultured voice. "I
wouldn't dare go out on the front porch wearing this dirty dress. It
simply isn't my way of living." Mary is about five feet tall and wears
her straight, snowy-white hair in a neat knot low on the back of her
head. The sparkle in her bright brown eyes bespeaks a more youthful
spirit than her wrinkled and almost white face would indicate. She was
wearing a soiled print dress, brown cotton hose, and high-topped black
shoes. In remarkably good English for one of her race she told that her
daughter's family lives with her, "so that I won't be right by myself."
Then she began her story:

"Honey, what is it you want me to tell you. Where was I born? Oh, my
child! I was born right here in dear old hilly Athens. Yes, that's where
I was born. Polly Crawford was my mother, and she belonged to Major
William H. Crawford before he gave her to his son, Marse John Crawford.
Now about my father, that is the dream. He died when I was just a little
child. They said he was Sandy Thomas and that he was owned by Marster
Obadiah Thomas, who lived in Oglethorpe County. All I can remember about
my grandparents is this: When I found my grandma, Hannah Crawford, she
was living on Major Crawford's plantation, where Crawford, Georgia, is
now. Grandma was a little, bitty woman; so little that she wore a number
one shoe. She was brought here from Virginia to be a field hand, but she
was smart as a whip, and lived to be 118 years old. I used to tell my
mother that I wished I was named Hannah for her, and so Mother called me
Mary Hannah.

"I can't bring my grandfather to mind very clearly. I do remember that
my mother took me to Penfield to see him, and told me if I wasn't a good
little girl he would surely whip me. They called him 'Uncle Campfire',
because he had such a fiery temper. For a living, after he got to be an
old man, he made cheers (chairs), but for the life of me I don't know
who he belonged to, because Major Crawford sold him before I was born.

"There were five of us children: Nat, Solomon, Susannah, Sarah, and
myself. Marse John gave Solomon to his daughter, Miss Fannie, when she
married Marse William H. Gerdine. Susannah belonged to Miss Rosa Golden,
and Sarah and I belonged to the other Miss Fannie. She was Marse John's
sister. Nat was Marse John's house boy, and our mother was his cook. We
children just played around the yard until we were large enough to work.

"Yes, my dear, I was born in Marse John's back