Document text
Caberrus Mill
Concord, N. C.
umpteen?' 3, 1938
g. L. W.
TCR
The Fletobers live user the foot of the hill on
Young street. Ruby Fletcher' mother says thet her
runt lived on this same street nearly thirty...five- years
ago. k1it'e in old street, been here about forty years,
end it sure looks like they would here done something
to mike it look better in all that time."
he looks up the bill at the glazing white send
rod that humps up in the middle, rt the ragged benks,
et the little sous?e frame houses that straggle along
the rod. 'hen the houses Isere built apparently each
ref, lard* to fit the lry of the pertioular spot of land
on which it stood; consemuently, some ere below the
street level in front end on high piles behizal (like
the Fletoher±v); others trind on impregnable looking
bFnks, or are built on slender brick piles end F re
retched by e long flight of rooden ;-teps in front.
erersleyos little girl (rith the Airley Temple
permenent F nd the fat, round taut) srid the eostman
e tlways telling her °come here, sister, end get this
mail. I don't believe I ern mite it up all them steps."
ore of the houses twee been printed fairly recently,
others grow dingy.
There ere no trees along the street to of ten
the glare of the sunlight. A few yerds hove msell,
ornamental shrub -like growths, but the only large trees
in any yerd FTO Caroline iioplars rlready practically
byre. At the top of the hill some of the houses have
bare dirt yards, but further down most lawns ere grassy
and here flowers somewhere around. Mrs. iressleyls
sloping front lawn, which lies for below her porch, is
e mese of rinnies, marigolds, golden glows, end other
summer flowers; her porch iv shaded with thick vines,
und t 'twisty of potted plonts line the bannisters.
At the crest of the hill, close to the houses, is
u little white from church the Young treet baptist.
m3ross from it is 0,, small store somewhet on the order
of r pop stand.
The hot sun of the ptember morning best down on
t7uiet, almost deserted Young 7..itreet. A baby with r
rod parasol end r little girl with E tee cup in her
bend were the only humens in sight; they are on the
porch of the dingy little house niter the foot of the
hill. -4hen I raked if their isma 'ere home and if she
were busy, the little girl said hestily "I don't live
11 -*re„ but she does," pointing to the beby. "I'll go
tell Iiies Fletoher you're here, though," end the derted
into the house leering me with the baby who was bright-
eyed end rttrective in spite of ite pitiful reohitio
legs end en eruption of some kind. "Ales Fletcher will
be here in just e minute, nud the little girl stooped
to brush off some black pertioles thet olung to the
beby's foonth. "It'e some of that tee I wee borrowing
from 4se Fletcher guess I spilled some; I'll declare
Alice Jene will eet nnything the ern get her hands on."
A ple?sent looking young woman, with a child behind
her, ppeered in the doorway. "How. -do," the geld shyly
and fingered the neck of her blue dresc. "I'm awful
sorry -10:y, so busy now," she enamored to my reeuest to
talk with her, "but my husbrnd comes home for his dinner
at eleven ololock, tad I'm Just bound to have it reedy.
You could go over end telk with Use Pressley, she eende
her husband's dinner and the can talk better then
I ern. (-Jr if you could come beck some other time when
I'm not so busy."
.be stood cautiously behind the worsen door all
the time the wee taking, perhaps the did not eant me
to see that the wee barefooted. As I left the told me
her name wee ruby Fletcher.
After 3:30 in the efternoon Young Street bursts
with life. The front porches ere full of men in overalls,
girls in gay summer dresses, end housewives most of
them still berefooted end reering their work dresses.
hedios ere going, cers beck out of driveways, e men is
polishing t gre stove in his beck yerd, two girls in
cringe sleeks end white shirts walk down the road.
The Fletcher's smell porch seemed full when I cane
up in the efternoon. ruby greeted me in her sweet,
ouiet manner and asked me to hews e chair, but she did
not get up nor did she introduce me to the older woman
end the chubby teen-ege girl who were sitting with her.
I leerned thrt the women WEP her mother, Alice Oendle,
end the girl wrs e neighbor. For e while Alice erndle
did most of the talking. t;he kept up s lively flow of
convereetion; Ruby occrsionelly mede brief remark;
the neighbor girl put down the blue silk dress on which
she hed been sewing, end etered et me; Ruby's two
children, Darlene red Aloe Jen., devoted themselves
to the whole peckage of chewing gum I give them.
"Don't I look pretty?" huby Faked, looking down
at the blue cotton dress she hed worn in the morning.
end Ft her bare feet. °I don't knave rhy I put on this
olo rag this morning, less it wee beciuse I wta in such
r hurry. ;ad these young'uns ere e sight," she ssid
as she gathered them into the house with her. he
seemed to feel much more tt ease when the reappepred
leeding Darlene P.M Alice Jane, immtculete in clean
home-mede .in suite.
As ftbi Fletcher put its she hes her hands full,
what with ctring for the house, helping in the garden,
cooking, sewIng, and watching fter the children.
anoe the was three years old the hes lived in Concord,
an6 the .rent PO high ne the seventh grade in the Long
'school, which is the grammes school most of the mill.
children attend. :She said the guess the would heve
gone to Uigh 5chool except thet when the time came to
go she was sick so she just never did etert. instead
she kept house for her .nother who worked in the mill;
her ftther we deed. Then, when she A -Fla seventeen,
Ruby married Or.r1 Fletcher. r1. had worked in the
mill tad saved money so he could go to High 6ohool for
two yeers. °He purely worked hard for those two yeers,
but he night just te well have kept his zone', a accord-
ing to Ruby, "becruee he got merried utter that and
couldn't finish. lihet good did it ever do him? Alzing
her twenty-threc: years RUby hre never worked in the mill
t dty, but the admits she would like to have r job there
becnuse she's tired of doing nothing but keep house.
Carl le about the same E:ge as tuOy. he is tell
end thin, with a sensitive feoe end intelligent dark
eyes. Hie work is tying knots for the waiving machine
(Ruby's at n wage of 58# an hour (less the
recant 10;, out). Ahen he gets out of the sill in the
efternoon, Carl enjoys playing with the children,
working eround the house or in the garden. The first
afternoon I met aim, he was scraping the paint off an
ola otk sideboard of the mirror-and-double-deoker era.
Sy rea;oving the top pert and mirror, he made what had
been a rather hideous piece of furniture into E
eimpler ano better -looking buffet for the conbination
dining room -kitchen. He sede F very ingenuous scraping
device by bending en iron file. '4.andpaper never would
have telen off ell the coats of paint on that sideboard,'
he explained.
This summer Crrl went to the trmy training camp
in 4sais.ippt for two weeks. wait it seemed like two
months to me, Ruby told me when we hed become well
toouainted. "I wee so lonesome, I thought I'd die.
lhen he come home he boubt arlene F blue parasol
Jilioe Jens F red one, just like the ones I had got
for them the Saturday before rt the dime store. It
mare *FS Natty."
For amusement the Fletohers heve the movies (but
they don't go often), the mill besibell grounds where
they can watch the boys ploy herd bell and the girls
plty soft ball, end the town bteebell genes. They
don't have c cer of their own, but they can sometimes
borrow rl's father's or maybe his brother's cps.
week Lgo they went to the mountains. The Sadly
goes to the foung zitreet Baptist aurch, which etends
on the hill, and Qurl sings in the choir. awe Friday
nights azlene goes to choir prrctice with him.
0.uby likes the little four room house for which
they pay .1.64 every two weeks. 'It's betver.botrded
rll over inside and the neighbor re just as nice
re they orn be; it's bandy being so close to my frther.
inp-lew too. The only trouble is there's no place for
the cilhreh to play; the gtrden'e in the beck yard
rad the street' so close to the house in front I'm
tfrrin to let Alice Jrne elone there for t minute.
This front porch is so hot of c orning, you just crn't
set on it, Out it's re1.1 nice in the rfternoon since
thrt vine rt the e Rrev up.
The little liwn around the house is well kept,
tX ineid,e every room is extremely mart cud °leen.
The front eparoor.3 is furninhed with r ouite made of
golden -brown wood, deoorf!ted with scroll work et the
top; the living room hi s suite of wicker furniture
nd the only 'aril decoretion is Urge tinted portrait,
robtbly of somr.. member of the femily; the beck bedroom
her rn iron bed, n osk bureru, a linoleum rag; the
kitchen, tlso used ts dining room, hes e large oilcloth
covered teble, rn dil stove, r sink with a piece of
oilcloth behind it to protect the well, E. kitchen cabinet
rnd the recently renovated sidebotrd; the floor is
covered. 7,1,th linoleum. Uuteide the kitchen door stands
r lrge, •slerming white electric refrigerrtor. The
four roous open from r hell thrt runs through the center
of the house. it the end of tali; h11 is t smell,
screened b%ck ?orch and from this porca the brthroom
reched. It Joen not oonaect irectly with the
houme.
,cite tht, rA.eunlinesE. Of the 4ouse, the rir in
it sf7 P ntuffy, ')rotp,bly bt!oure thc windows so
fer. ThiLl 1,,ould recount to for the fisnes of the rooms.
/tout five °scion): in the rfternoon number of
men, 7'omen, end children begta rtrefAin by the Fletcher
I:Ou7ruli..inc down tor d the merdoe ;*t. the very end
Of the vtreet. I noticed mrny of them cfrried buckets
end on little boy pushed his younger brother and
e large bucket together in a wheelbarrow. I was curious
rz to where they were ping.
*They're e.going to plop their hogs that they keep
darn in the bottom lends" t1io Cendle etid. *Raby and
Carl have finm hog dewn there, had another one but
hit died of the look...jaw.*
Carl usuelly feeds the hog, but since I wented to
see it, Ruhr nald eh* would go with me. Shtle Cal
mixed the slop under the spigot iu the front yard,
Ruby went in the house pot on matt-oolored high heel
sendels end s clean green cotton dress trimmed with
white caller, cuffs end pockets. She combed her hair,
arranging her permanent 'eve becomingly.
is we walked down pest the lest houees PO the
street, the road dwindled into a little footpath between
the tall meadow greases. by explained that the
pig pens in the bottom land belonged to e colored malts
rnd the people rented them from him for :2.0!) t year.
She pointed out too e strip of corn on the slope above
the pens. °That's Carlos corn, he rents the patch
from his brother -134m
About t dozen hogs ?moo kept in the peas screened
by the high grass. Around one pea a cluster of men
gathered while one men inside the pen examined a hog.
It had hurt its leg, but they didn't think it was
broken. Another group of an in overals leaned
against r wooden fence no talked; little boys Ailled
their comemade wagon up and down the paths that thread-
ed the grass; woman, surrounded by her cAildren, held
the end of e cow chain and was gently tagging the cow
away frot the thick grass toward Come.
The late afternoon sun filled the metdow and
gilded the corntcps on the hillside. At that moment
it was not herd to understand why ftsiby Fletoher felt
the mill is p0 good a way to make an honest living
FS any.0