Document text
August 7. 1939
pioneer Mull (white)
Broad Street, Brevard, N.C.
Meat elerk in a grocery
A.M. Lome writer
Brevard„ N.C.
IACX 0 T C
Ortq Iciagsa
Spenser Mull
Brevord„
‘.1
Changed Names
Zook Oollup
Turman N.C.
JACK IALLUF1 MAT CLERK
116o you wondsr why I have s nt the last ten years of my
life behid4 this meat counter," said Jack lallup. *You think
1 ought to be dolnl something better, do you? Well, I'll tell
you. For one thing, I never would study in school and 1 dropped
out at the end of the fifth grade; and another thing is, I
have never been able to get any money ahead because I speitt it
on gasoline and liquor. I an not much over thirty, but I might
have saved up enough money by now to start a small business of
my own. I know the groeory business and I know the .at business
from top to bottom. Wy uncle's store has a good trade and I
do all the buyinI for the meat counter and the stand behind the
counter to out it and wiegb it. ?articular people oome in
hers and it's my business to alease then. In the course of
time, you know, a an *an learn anything if he puts his mind
on it. I eould have learned something out of books when
was in school, but I wasn't unite to Dut my mind on it. I
was intervsted in marbles and baseball and in playinl prakks
on the other boys and in deviling the teae.ers. A good lawyer
here in Tuoony once told my mother I'd make a Toad lawyer if
I'd only study, but I wouldn't. What little I know I've learned
right here in this store. In sellin meat I learned some
arithnletio because I hud to, und I've learned to speak fairly
good Snglish from educated people who oome in here to trade.
I've always kept y ears open, and that's easier than studyin,
books and worth more; I never could see much in books,
remember at least one thing I heard a teacher.say. It was
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somethin' about 1;tying too dear for your whistle. These
people who get n book education have to pay too much for it.
I may not be riIht but that's my way of thinkinve Anyhow
I wasn't wtlltn to pay the price. It may be worth it to
some people but not to me.
Have I always lived in Tueonyl !lost of ry life* I was
born out in the country six miles from town on a farm my
granddaddy bought when this was a wild country, and I had my
fun fishinl and huntin, and trappinl. I vent to school when
I had to, and I worked in the cornfield when I had to, but my
daddy had to lick me sometimes to make me do it. I reckon
the way I lived out in the country is that tkee me so strong
and healthy.
*when 7,4 dadd; moved into town so my sisters could go to
h1311 school, I got a job as an errand boy in a grocery store,
and I don't ever seem be able to get away from groeeries.
When I was growle up I got several other small jobs, but I
didn't keep any of 'am lon. I got to running round nights
with the boys and we used to drink and prowl about, und some-
timas we got into fights and landed in the cooler. It coat
my daddy a lot of money to get me out of trouble, and it was
at a time when he had mighty little money. I don't know why
it is uut when I get liquor in me I want to fight. I'm just
a plain fool.
*Finally my uncle took me into. his grocery and put me
behind the meat counts I got drunk or.ce in a :;rest while
and he always threatened to fire me but he never did. He's
a queer old duo but he's goø4-hearted, Ho hatoo to see
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money go out of his hands but he'll give a bunch of ripening
bananas to some of his kin to help feed the chillun. 3cie
people would rather ive thins to strangers than to their
kin. Not my unele. Be abuses everybody who works for him
but he is good to them in many ways. Hell do anything for
tbem except rise their wages some of them have been with him
a long time. He and his wife work hard she with her butter
making avd he behind his counter or on the road looking after
his branch stores in neighborin towns. He drives his own
automobile and he goes like the devil was after him. Me says
time'a money, and money is what he wants. Two or three times
he has run his car off the mountainside and rolled over and
over, but he's so tough he was back at work in a day or so.
He rowls and says he's nearly dead but he goes on. I one*
told him he wasn't fit to die. I expected he'd beat me over
the head with a stick, but he only laughed.
°He never goes to his own church because he hears too
much there about hell and damnation. He says maybe hell
learn enough about hell when he dies, at /)resent he is too
busy to bother about it. once in a great while he goes to
another church which he greatly respects, because no member
go
of this church owes him a bud debt. Whenever he does/to
church he washes his fees and puts on a clean shirt; then
you have to look at him twice before you on be sure who it
is. All through the week he wears the same shirt By the
end of the week he look, like amethin,; the eat has dragged
in. akin' of oats, his wife has fifteen cats, many named
for her neighbors, and when she gets through lookint after
her oats an. her cows, she hasn't much time left for washing
the old gentleman's shirts
when I got married, I rented one of ly uncle's cottages.
He told me if I would quit drinkine he'd leave me this cottage
in his will. I wouldn't promise because I wasn't sure I Gould
keep my word, and also because I was afraid he milbt forget
to change his will. As meant what be snid at the time, but
he has so many thine on hms mind he might forget about the
cottage.
*This old town is changing fast these day::. One of the
bosses at the new mill comes in here to get meat, and after
he had been here a few times he asked me if I didn't vent a
job out at the mill. He seemed to take a fancy to me for
some reason or other. I told him I was ready to listen be-
cause my hours here at the store wer long and hard. I had
to do all the buyinf, and also most of the sellinl, and I
had to work until eight o'clock every night and until midnight
on aaturday nights.
This offer of a job at the mill I talked over with my
ma,
uncle. He said he didn't want/to go and be raised my salary
from 418 to .420 a week. eio I stayed on. But when I peid my
rent at the end of the month I found it had been raised on me
for exactly the amount of the inorew-e in my wales. o I
wasn't making a dollar more than I had been making. This
made me a little sore, and when the mill boss came into the
store aAain I asked him if his offer was still open. It was.
accepted. Then I told my uncle I was leaving him at the
end of the wook Hs seemed terribly upset and began looking
around for somebody to take my place. The busy summer season
was on and he needed a good man. He went around like a chicken
with his head out off, but he couldn't find anybody he liked
or could trust. He finally came to me with tears in his eyes.
He is not a well an t.n4 he was real pitiful. He said if
me
would stay he'd give/my house rent free and furnish me free
milk from his own cows; also that he'd leave me the cottage
in his will. ell. I'm now getting free rent and free milk,
but whether I'll aver 3et the cottage after the old gentleman
d'es rtmoine to be seen, It .ot placing any bets on it.
*1 married a nlee girl and we have the cutest baby girl
ever born. The only trouble is, she likes to use her voice
at night; she's a nightingale. My wifo's only fault is she
can't see a joke; not even with a magnifyin glass, 4hen I
tell her the baby looks almost human she frowns. Cold mornings
1 tell her to get up and make a fire, for that's what I married
her for; also that as soon as th, weather turns warm I'll not
need her loner and then I'll send her baek to her mother. She
believes me and gets unhappy. I also tell her maybe /y11 keep
her on until the baby is old enough to go down to the store
with me. She believes that also. Well, it's not every man's
wife who believes everything her husband tells her.
*When my wife takes the baby and czoes to visit her folks,
get so lonesome I don't know what to do, I always want to
see that baby around, I can't live alone in that empty house,
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so I go and stay with my mother and sisters. When I lertve
work at ni?ht I brinns with me a large juicy steak and I
cook it nyself. I like to cook and I never burn nothing
because I keep my eye on what an doing. My sisters burn
nearly everything they touch; they are talking about the
neighbors or thinking about the new styles in hats. These
women folks never can keep their minds on what they are
doing.
As for my uncle and his business, I reckon well jog
along together. I know his ways and he knows mine. The
mill an tells me there's a job in the mill for me whenever
I want it. That's an ace I'll keep up my sleeve. If my
uncle ever sets on a h!mh horse, I'll talc,- it out and show
it to him. He knows a face card when he sees it."