on State Street.
She is about ninety years old. I went to Jube Williams (white), Current
Lewis, Abbie Lindsay, and A.G. Mertin. They did n't paas you by grades
then. I got through the fourth reader. If you got through, they would go
back and carry you through again. They had the old Blue Back Speller. I
got ready for the fifth reader but I quit. I had just begun to cipher,
in arithmetic, but I had to quit because they could n't spare me out of
the field. In fact they put me into the field when I was eight years
old, but I managed to go to school until I was about twelve years old or
something like that. I never got a year's schooling all put together. My
mother was a widow and had five or six children, none of them able or
big enough to work but my oldest sister. She raised five of us.

If I had done as she told me, I might have been a good scholar. But I
played around and went off with the other children. I learnt way
afterwards when I was grown how to write my name. I could work addition
and I could work some in multiplication, but I couldn't work division
and couldn't work subtraction. Come around any time, specially on Sunday
afternoons.

Name of Interviewer: Velma Sample
Subject: NEGRO LORE--THE STORY OF CASIE JONES BROWN

Casie Jones Brown was a dearly loved Negro servant. He was known for his
loving kindness toward children, both black and white. Lots of the white
children would say, "Casie sure is smart" because Casie was a funny and
witty old darkie. Casie has a log house close to his master, Mr. Brown.
They live on what is called the Brown Plantation. The yard had large old
cedars planted all around it. They were planted almost a century ago.
The plantation is about six miles from Paragould, [TR: possibly
Baragould] Arkansas, where the hills are almost mountains. There have
been four generations living in the old house. They have the big sand
stone fireplaces. Casie has a spiritual power that makes him see and
hear things. He says that sometimes he can hear sweet voices somewhere
in his fireplace. In the winter time he does all of his cooking in a big
black kettle with three legs on it, or a big iron skillet. And when he
first settled there he did not have a stove to cook on except the
fireplace. He says the singing that comes from somewhere about the
fireplace is God having his angels entertain him in his lonely hours.
Casie is 91 years old and has been in that settlement as long as he can
remembe