Document text
Forms to be Filled out for Each Interview
FORMA
Circumstances of Interview
STATE New York City
NAME OF WORKER Levi C. Hubert
ADDRESS
DATE
353 West 118th St. Man.
December 1, 1938
SUBJECT ANECDOTES —WILLIAM MTTJA
1. Date and time of' interview
October 29, 1938
Afternoon
2. Place of interview
329 Haley Street. Bklyn
3. Name and address of informant
William Mills
329 Halsy Street, Bklyn
4. Name and address of person, if any, who put you in
touch with informant.
Personal contact
5. Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you
FOLKLORE
NEW YORK
6. Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.
Private house remodelled into apartments. This was a second floor
whichwas renovated into a 3 room andbath. Occupants came
originally from North Carolina, living room contained day -couch
which converted room at night into bedroom. Potted plants occupied
space in front of fireplace. Overheated as usual with such places.
The street is one in better neighborhood of Brooklyn.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, for any of the forms, each
bearing the proper heading and the number to which the material refers.)
FORM C
Text of Interview (roditeJ)
wrAcrE New York City
NAME OF WWAER Levi C. Hubert
ADDRESS 353 West 118th S. Manhattan.
DATE December 1, 1938
SUBJECT ANECDOTES --WILLIAM Mnts
BARBER -SHOP SPECIALS)
FOLKLOBE
NEW YORK
There was the time down South it was so hot the farmers
were compelled to feed their chickens cracked ice to prevent them
from laying hard-boiled eggs.
%OW
And another time, right after the Civil War, one of the
former slaves actually received his forty acres and a mule. He
planted his forty acres in corn. But somehow he used pop corn
and one day he was using his mule to culti4ate the corn and it
became so hot, so doggone hot, the sun started the corn to popping
and the popped corn covered the field like snow. The mule saw this
snow -like blanket covering the field and there on the hottest day of
the year the mule froze to death.
The soil down South is said to be so rich that one youLg
farmer sowed his fields with acorns. He started one morning to sow
and the acorns took root and grew up so fast that by evening the trees
were so tall and large the farmer got lost in the forest.
-2
Then I came up north and the weather was so cold, so
doggone cold, the first year I was up North that the farmers had
to put in steam heat in the cow's belly to keep her from giving
ice cream.
Why, it got so cold that I tried to talk with another fellow
and when we opened out mouths to speak the words froze up bald dropped
on the ground. Do you know we had to pick up the frozen words and
thaw -Chem out so that we could find out what we were saying to
each other.
Why, one time in Philadelphia it got so cold that, especially
down in the center of the city, William Penn got down off the top of
City Hall, put his hands in his pockets, walked in a drugstore and said,
"Phew. This is the coldest day I've seen in many a year."
Man, I live on One Hundred and Thirty-third Street. And
that's the toughest street in New York. Why, it's so tough that all
the canaries sing bass. And all of the toughest fellows live on one
end of the street. And, Man, I'm so tough I have to live four miles
past the tough end.
It was a woman who lust came to New York from Way Down South
out in the country. She stayed in a flat in Harlem with some of her
folks. One day they left her alone in the house tow/N atch the
children. Soon the buzzer of the dumb -waiter sounded. This old lady
opened the dumb -waiter door and she heard a voice. So -she shouted,
"What diya want?"
A voice shouted up the shaft to her,
"Garbage?"
"Taint no Garbage here. This is Johnson's. You got the
wrong apartment." And she shut the dumb -waiter door.