Frank Kennedy
From:
Arkansas
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Frank Kennedy,
Holly Grove, Arkansas
Age: 65 or 70?
"My parents' name was Hannah and Charles Kennedy. They b'long to
Master John Kennedy. I was raised round Aberdeen, Mississippi but they
come in there after freedom. I heard em talk but I couldn't tell you
much as where they come from. They said a young girl bout got her
growth would auction off for more than any man. They used em for cooks
and house women. I judge way they talked she be fifteen or sixteen
years old. They brought $1,600 and $2,000. If they was scared up,
where they been beat, they didn't sell off good. I knowed Master John
Kennedy.
"The Ku Klux come round but they didn't bother much. They would bother
if you stole something. Another thing they made em stay close bout
their own places and work. I don't know bout freedom.
"I been farmin' and sawmillin' at Clarendon. I gets jobs I can do on
the farms now. I got rheumatism so I can't get round. I had this
trouble five years or longer now.
"The times is worse, so many folks stealin' and killin'. The young
folks don't work steady as they used to. Used to get figured out all
you raised till now they refuse to work less en the money in sight.
They don't work hard as I allers been workin'.
"I got one girl married. I don't have no land nor home. I works for
all I have yet.
"I have voted--not lately. I think my color outer vote like the white
folks do long as they do right. The women takin' the mens' places too
much it pears like. But they may be honester. I don't know how it will
be."
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W Kerns
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Watt Mckinney
