"I come to Arkansas because they said money was easy to get--growed on
bushes. I had four little children to make a living for and they said it
was easier.

"I think people is better than they was long time ago. Times is harder.
People have to buy everything they have as high as they is, makes money
scarce nearly bout a place as hen's teeth. Hens ain't got no teeth. We
don't have much money I tell you. The Welfare gives me $8."

Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor
Person interviewed: Joseph Samuel Badgett
1221 Wright Avenue, Little Rock, Arkansas
Age: 72

[HW: Mother was a Fighter]

"My mother had Indian in her. She would fight. She was the pet of the
people. When she was out, the pateroles would whip her because she
didn't have a pass. She has showed me scars that were on her even till
the day that she died. She was whipped because she was out without a
pass. She could have had a pass any time for the asking, but she was too
proud to ask. She never wanted to do things by permission.

Birth

"I was born in 1864. I was born right here in Dallas County. Some of the
most prominent people in this state came from there. I was born on
Thursday, in the morning at three o'clock, May the twelfth. My mother
has told me that so often, I have it memorized.

Persistence of Slave Customs

"While I was a slave and was born close to the end of the Civil War, I
remember seeing many of the soldiers down here. I remember much of the
treatment given to the slaves. I used to say 'master' myself in my day.
We had to do that till after '69 or '70. I remember the time when I
couldn't go nowhere without asking the 'white folks.' I wasn't a slave
then but I couldn't go off without asking the white people. I didn't
know no better.

"I have known the time in the southern part of this state when if you
wanted to give an entertainment you would have to ask the white folks.
Didn't know no better. For years and years, most of the niggers just
stayed with the white folks. Didn't want to leave them. Just took what
they give 'em and didn't ask for nothing different.

"If I had known forty years ago what I know now!

First Negro Doctor in Tulip, Arkansas

"The first Negro doctor we ever seen come from Little Rock down to
Tulip, Arkansas. We were all excited. There were plenty of people who
didn't have a doctor living with twenty miles of them. When I was
fourteen years old, I was secretary of a conference.