Ku Klux but I never seen any. We was expectin' 'em
though at all times.

"My grandmother belonged to Creed Taylor and after freedom mama got her
and she lived there with the Sculls two years. My mother and father was
paid a salary and they paid me too--four dollars a month. And I remember
mama never would let me have it--just give me what she wanted me to
have. They treated us better than they did before the war. Cose they was
a little rough, but they couldn't whip you like they did. They could
threaten it though.

"I went to school just a little after freedom. Mama and papa wasn't able
to send me. Wasn't no colored teachers competent to teach then and we
had to pay the white teacher a dollar a month.

"I had very strict parents and was made to mind. When I went out I knew
when I was comin' in. I had one daughter who died when she was eight
years old and if I could bring her back now, I wouldn't do it cause I
know she would worry me to death.

"I used to sew a lot for people in Pine Bluff but I am too old now. I
own my home and I have some rooms rented to three young men students and
I get a little help from the Welfare so I manage to get along.

"Well good-bye--I'm glad you come."

#748
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Mary Jane Hardrige
1501 W. Barraque, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 79

"Well, I don't believe in signs much. My sister was sick about a year
once. They said she had the T. B. (tuberculosis). One day I was there
and she said, 'Sis, do you hear that peckerwood? He's drivin' a nail in
my coffin.' And sure enough she died not long after.

"But let me tell you I had a peculiar dream yesterday morning just
before day. There's a little child here. His mother died and left him,
the baby child. I dreamt his mother brought him to me. She said, 'I
brought my boy here and I want you to keep him.' I thought he come to me
just as naked as he could be. He kept sayin', 'Come on, Mrs. Hardrige,
and let's go home, I'm cold.' He didn't have a garment on. His mother
was with him and she's dead you know.

"I mentioned it to one of my neighbors and she said it was a sign of
some woman's death.

"I was very much devoted to the child. I love him, and that dream stayed
with me all day. I don't know but I've always heard if you dream of the
dead it's goin' to rain.

"I ain't four miles from where I was born. I was born across the river.
We belonged to Jim Scul