Document text
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Forms to be Filled out for Each Interview
FORMA
Circumstances of Interview
STATE New York
NAME OF WORKER Ralph El] ison
ADDRESS 470 W. 150th St.
DATE June 7th, 1939
SUBJECT
1. Date and time of interview June 6th, 1939
FOLKLORE
NEW YORK
JUN 1 9 1939
2. Place of interview Colonial Park near 150th St., Man.
3. Name and address of informant
4. Name and address of person, if any, who put you in
touch with informant.
5. Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you
6. Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.
A City Park, benches and childrensi Playground.
Behind us, the strata of rock leading up to Edgecome Avenue.
The Subject is an elderly Negro man, born in Virginia.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, for any of the forms,
each bearing the proper headini_ and the number to which the material
refers.)
FORM C
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TEXT OF INTERVIEW (Unedited)
XXIMTICVNNXXX
STATE New York
NAME OF WORKER Ralph Ellison
ADDRESS 470 W. 150th St.
DATE June 7th, 1939
SUBJECT
FOLKLORE
NEW YORK
Its too bad bout them two submarines. They can
experiment an everything, but they caint go but so far.
Then God steps in. Them fellows is trying to make some-
thing what'll stay down. They said they'd done done it,
but look what happened. Take back in 1912. They built
a ship callei. the Titanic. Think they built it over in
England; I thinks that was where it was built. Anyway,
they said it couldnit sink. It was for all the biz rich
folks; John Jacob Astor -all the big, aristocrats. Nothing
the color of this could git on the boat. Naw suht Didnt
want nothin- look like me on it. One girl went down to
go with her madam and they told her she couldnt -o. They
didnt want nothin,, lock like this on there. They told
the madam "you cvn go, but she caint." The girls madam got
mad and told em If the girl didnt go she wasnt going. And
she didnt neither. Yessuh, she stayed right here.
Well, they sot this big boat on the way over to En-
gland. They said she couldnt sink that was man talking..
It was so big they tell me that was elevators in it like
across yonder in that building. Had the richest folks in
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England, almost ready to dock, and ups an hits a iceberg, and sank!
That was the boat they said was so big it couldnt sink. They didnt
want nothing look like this on it; no ssuh1 And dont you think that
woman wasnt :lad she stuck by that girl. She was plenty glad. Tan
can only
go so far.
Then Cod steps in. She they can experment around.
They can do a heap. They can even make a man. But they caint make
him breath. Why the other day I was down on 125th St., and 8th Ave.
They got one of then malted milk places. Well suh, they got a cow
on the counter. It looks like a real cow. Cot hair. I was stand-
ing there looking and the dogs -one thin-: moved its head and wagged
its tail; man done even made a cow. Put, they had to do it with
electricity.
Golp the only one can give life. God trade all this, and he made
it for everybody. And he made it equal. This breeze and these grEon
leaves out here is for everybody. The same sun's shining down on
everybody. This breeze comes from God and man caint do nothing about
It. I breath the same air old man Ford an old man Rockerfeller breath.
The: got all the :_oney an I a:nt got nothing, but they got to breath
the same air I do.
:ran caint make no man. Less see now: This heahs nineteen-hun-
dre_i-ond-twenty-nine. For 1900 :ears mans had th1,---s his way. Res
been rrnrin- the world
to suit hisself. Its just like your father
owned that buildin7, over there and told you you could live in it if
you didnt dc certain things. And then you did what he told :ou not
to. And lie finds it out and sa:, "Co on, you can have the whole
building, I wont have nothing else to do with it. You can turn it
upside-down if you want to." 114e11, that was the way it was in the
world. Adam an Eve sinned in the Garden and God left the world to
itself. I e_ been run.,,In: It like they wont to. They been running
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it like they w ont to for 1900 years. Rich folds done took all the
land. The; got all the money. Men down to the City Hall making
"p50,000 dollars a year and nothing like this caint even scrub the
marble floors or polish the brass what the: got down there. Old man
Ford and J.P.Yorgan got all that ,Ione: and folks in this park caint
even ,et on relief. But you just watch: the lawd made all men equal
and pretty soon IOW its gonna be that way agin. In a man. I breath
the same air old man 2ord breaths cause God made man equal. God
formed man in his own image. Be made Adam out of the earth; not like
this concreate we sitting on, but out of dirt, clay. Like you seen
a kid making a snow man. git him a stick and make the arms.
And he'll get another stick and make for his nech; and so on, just
lihe we got bones. That was the wa; God made man. Made him outa
clay and in his ow.n image: That was the way he made Adam One drop
of God's blood made all the nations in the world; Africans, Germans,
ChInTnen, Jews, Indians; all cone from one drop of Sod's blood. God
took s)1,.eth_, otta Adarr and made woman, be made Eve. The ,Dreachers
tell a lie and soy it was his rib. But they have to lie I guess.
They didnt dc nothing but sit back in the shed and let :ou do all the
work anyway. But God went into Adam and tocl- something out and made
Eve. TIcts the Scriptures; it said he took sonethilial_ t caint re-
member the e::act words, but it said "-e took sorethin- and it didnt
say nothing bout no rib. Eve started having children. Some of em
was black and some of em was white. But the: was all equal. God
didnt know no color; we all the same. All be want from man is this
heart thumping the blood. Them what take advantage of skin like
this _Lot to cone by God. The gonna pay.
Tbey tell me bout ol George WashIngton. He was the first presi-
dent this country ever bad, Frist thing T heard was he said keep us
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look like this down in the cornfield. He tole em "dont let em have
no guns. You aint to let em have no knife. Dont let em have noth-
ing. "He tole en if they wanted to have a strong nation to keep us
down. He said if ever the -‘y git guns in they hands theyll rise up
and take the land; dont let em havt nothing. But he didnt says noth-
ing bout no pick and axl"
They been carrying out what he said. God didnt say nothing.
That was just mans idea and here in this country they been carrying
out what old man George Washington said. But God's time is coming.
Today you hear all these folks got millions of dollars talking bout
God. The: aint fooling nobody, though. They even gdt "IN GOD WE
TRUST" on all the silver money. But it dont mean nothing. This sun
and air is God's. It dont belong to nobody and caint no few get it
all to theyself. People around this park can have all they want.
But you wait. God's gonna straighten it all outl Look at the dust
blowing in that wind. Thats the way all the money they got gonna be.
You see things, folks, they call white, but man aint got no idea of how
white God con make things. Money wont be worth no moren that dust
blowing on the ground. iont be no men down to Washington making fifty
thousand dollars a weeh and folks caint hardl: make ejnhteen dollars
a month. Everybodyll he equal, in God's time. Wont be no old man
Rocherfeller, no suhi Today you caint even buy a job if you had the
money to do it with. Wont be nothing like that then. He'll let loose
and somethingll slip down here and them what done took advantage of
everything'11 be floating down the river. Youll -o over to the North
River, and over to the East River and yonll see em all floating along,
And the river'll be full and they wont know what struck em. The lawd's
gonna have his day.
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Theyll be a war. But it wont be no more wars like the World
War. It wont bother me and you. Wont really be no war. Itll be
the wicked killing the wicked! The war like the VvOrld War'll never
be agin. They fooled now. They building navies and buying guns.
But dont you worry, itll be just the wicked killing out the wicked.
Its comings; God's time is coming and its coming soon!