er the Civil War they were free and had a vote. As a boy the
Reverend remembers seeing the white and black soldiers marching on
election day.

The politicians would always tell the negroes what was good for them and
making it appear that it was for their best interest, and they should
vote for him, always giving them the desert first and making them think
that they were on the level no matter what the meal might be or what
hardships they were causing the negro to suffer. On one instance after
the negroes were forbidden to vote they marched in a body to the polls
and demanded a Democratic ballot and were then permitted to vote.

Rev. Wamble was twenty-seven years of age before he saw and read his
first newspaper. He lived with the Wambles for twenty years after the
war, when his father then in partnership with another man, purchased
forty acres of land. He attended his first school for a period of two
months only in 1871. In 1872 the government built a school on his
father's farm and it was taught by a missionary. The school term was for
a period of three months each year. The Reverend attended this school
for seven years.

In 1880 he married the first time. His first wife died in Memphis,
Tennessee, in 1888. By this marriage there were four children. On
February 1, 1892, the Reverend with his two surviving children all
entered school at a college in Little Rock, Arkansas. One of his
daughters died in the third year of her school year, but the other
graduated from the Normal School and was a teacher for several years. At
the present time she is married to a minister in Louisiana and is the
mother of ten children and is a nurse. The three oldest children have
degrees and the others are expected to do the same.

The Reverend married his second wife in 1894. She died in 1907. By this
marriage nine children were born.

The Reverend has been in the ministry for thirty-seven years. Seeing the
need of making more money, two of his sons came to Gary, Indiana, to
work in 1924. Now both are working in the post-office. Two years later
he came to Gary for the same reason and after working two years in the
coke plant, was laid off due to the depression. The youngest daughter of
the Reverend by his second marriage graduated from a college in Pine
Bluff, Arkansas, and is now teaching in New York City.

Although the Reverend is advanced in years, he is quite active and
healthy. He says he has a small pension and is just waiting un