eeks. I et at the same table
with the President. I slept in the White House. We et out of skillets
together when I was a little boy and drunk out of the same cups. Me and
him and Gummel raised up together. I played for the President and his
Cabinet.

"Twice more I went and it cost me nothing. I played for big balls. My
young master sent me my gold name plate. (It is heart shaped with his
name, birth and birthplace--ed.) I been wearing it on my watch chain a
long time. It is my charm. Mr. Lewis was so glad when I got my letter
and ticket. He was good to me.

"I have voted. I voted a Republican ticket because it hope the party out
that freed my race. Some white men told me they burnt up a lot of our
votes. I never seen it done. I can't see to fool with voting.

"The colored folks are seeing a worse time now than in slavery times.
There is two sides to it. The Bible say they get weaker and wiser. I did
read before I got blind. I get a Federal pension of one hundred dollars
a month. I'm thankful for it."

Interviewer's Comment

He has trouble talking. One lung is affected. He is deaf. He is blind.
He said he was wounded caused his lung trouble. Seems to me old age. He
isn't very feeble in the house. Their house was clean and he and his
wife, also born in slavery, looked clean.

Interviewer: Bernice Bowden
Person Interviewed: Laura Hart
Eleventh & Orange St., Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 85

"I just can't tell you when I was born cause I don't know. My mother
said I was born on Christmas Eve morning. I'm a old woman. I was big
enough to work in slave times.

"Yes ma'am. I member when the war started. I was born in Arkansas. I'm a
Arkansas Hoosier. You know I had to have some age on me to work in slave
times.

"I pulled corn, picked cotton and drive the mule at the gin. Just walked
behind him all day. I've pulled fodder, pulled cotton stalks, chopped
down corn stalks. I never worked in the house when I was a child while I
was under the jurisdiction of the white folks.

"My old master was Sam Carson and his wife was named Phoebe Carson, boy
named Andrew and a daughter named Mary and one named Rosie.

"We had plenty to eat and went to church on Sunday. After the white
folks had their services we went in. The church was on his place right
across the river. That's where I was when freedom taken place.

"When the war started--I remember that all right--cause when they was
gettin'