Oral History with Roxie Bryson, March 14, 1991 (Ms1991-019)

Partial Transcript: Michael A. Cooke: I’m conducting an interview with Roxie Ida Bryson of Shawsville, [Virginia]. Is it Ms. or Mrs.? I never asked. I’m sorry.
Roxie I. Bryson: No, I had been married but he died. My husband died.
Michael Cooke: So, we’ll call you Ms. Bryson-
Roxie Bryson: Bryson, yes.
Michael Cooke: Ms. Bryson, could you give us when you were born, the year, the date?
Roxie Bryson: 1913. August 31, 1913.
Michael Cooke: Okay, and were you born and raised in this area?
Roxie Bryson: What?
Michael Cooke: Were you born in this immediate hollow, Kirk’s Hollow?
Roxie Bryson: That’s right. I was born way back in this hollow. This far back in the hollow, but nobody lived over there now. That’s colored area.
Michael Cooke: So, the area was much bigger. I mean, there were more people living in this area at one time than there are presently?
Roxie Bryson: No, there’s more in there now than there was then.
Michael Cooke: But they lived farther back into the hollow-
Roxie Bryson: Yes.
Michael Cooke: And now they live closer to the roads-
Roxie Bryson: Yes.
Michael Cooke: That’s-
Roxie Bryson: I moved over here.
Michael Cooke: This is more convenient ‘cause you’re really close to the [U.S. Route] 460 and the—what else? To all the stores that are right off of [U.S. Route] 460.
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: If you were way back there, you gotta, that’s a longer walk if you gotta...
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, yeah.

Keywords: Kirk's Hollow; Roxie Ida Bryson; Shawsville, Virginia; U.S. Route 460

Subjects: Montgomery County (Va.); Roads

Partial Transcript: Michael Cooke: Well, tell us about when you were a girl. We about to go back, all the way back.
Roxie Bryson: I don’t know.
Michael Cooke: When you were a young girl, who were your parents?
Roxie Bryson: Charlie Smith and Cora Thompson.
Michael Cooke: And what kind of work did they do?
Roxie Bryson: Farm work’s all I know.
Michael Cooke: You know what kind of farm work they did?
Roxie Bryson: No, just for themselves.
Michael Cooke: Just for themselves? Corn, maybe, wheat and grain?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah-
Michael Cooke: So nothing major.
Roxie Bryson: Beans and potatoes and stuff like that. That’s all.
Michael Cooke: Yeah, just small things.
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: It kept them busy.
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: Did they do any other work besides that or did they look for work?
Roxie Bryson: My father was a butcher. I forgot about that.
Michael Cooke: So, he worked as a butcher?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: Was that part time or full time?
Roxie Bryson: Oh, just part time. Only on a Friday. That’s all.
Michael Cooke: On a Friday? Where did he do the butchering?
Roxie Bryson: Wherever they found the cows at-
Michael Cooke: Oh, no. People would call him up and say, well, we want you to butcher this cow today.
Roxie Bryson: Well, he would buy them, I guess. They maybe would say that. I don’t know what had...that was when they...
Michael Cooke: So, he did that.
Roxie Bryson: Um-hm.
Michael Cooke: Okay. What about your mother? Did she do any other work?
Roxie Bryson: She didn’t do nothing but house work.
Michael Cooke: House work, that’s a lot of work. Don’t dismiss that.

Keywords: butcher; Charlie Smith; childhood; Cora Thompson; corn; domestic work; farm work; farming; grain; house work; Kirk's Hollow; potatoes; Shawsville, Virginia; wheat

Subjects: Agriculture

Partial Transcript: Michael Cooke: Did you go to school or was there a school in this area?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, there was a school in Christiansburg, [Virginia]. There was one right by where I’m living at now-
Michael Cooke: Oh, it is.
Roxie Bryson: But they tore it down.
Michael Cooke: Tore it down?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: What kind of schools were they? Were they one room, two room, three room?
Roxie Bryson: Well, they had at least two rooms to them.
Michael Cooke: Did they have one or two teachers to them?
Roxie Bryson: Just one.
Michael Cooke: Just one teacher. Do you remember some of the people that taught school in this area?
Roxie Bryson: Ms. Harriet, Harriet Claytor.
Michael Cooke: Was she from this area?
Roxie Bryson: No, she lived in Roanoke.
Michael Cooke: Oh good heavens. Did she commute or did she board in this area?
Roxie Bryson: Oh, she rode back and forth.
Michael Cooke: Oh, she had a car?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: Oh that’s unusual ‘cause a lot of teachers didn’t afford to have a car.
Roxie Bryson: Um-hm.
Michael Cooke: So she drove back and forth in a car, her own car?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: Any other teachers you can recall?
Roxie Bryson: Mr. Franklin. He lived in Christiansburg.
Michael Cooke: Did he commute?
Roxie Bryson: Same thing. He boarded down here some, I think.
Michael Cooke: Okay, so he would stay, I guess, from, let’s see, Monday. I guess from Sunday to Friday probably, then head back home.
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, and sometimes he drove a car and drove back and forth sometimes. But most of the time, he stayed down from me in the house. But it’s burned down now.
Michael Cooke: Oh. So, he stayed with somebody in the community?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah. He stayed by, with his wife and him-
Michael Cooke: Oh, his wife was down here, too?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: That’s interesting. So, did they have any children or were they just-
Roxie Bryson: No not that I know of.
Michael Cooke: None at that time, okay. Do you recall the name of the school that—did they have a name?
Roxie Bryson: Nothing for Shawsville. Nothing but a public school’s all I know.
Michael Cooke: Okay, did you go to that school?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, I went.
Michael Cooke: How many years did you go to school?
Roxie Bryson: I don’t know how many years I went there. I got to twenty years old when I started...you know [inaudible 5:12] And went to the seventh grade.
Michael Cooke: For instance, if you wanted to go to high school, was it possible for people in this area to go to high school? Or was it convenient?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah some of them, but I don’t think we could afford that.
Michael Cooke: If you wanted to go to high school, how would you go about doing it? Would you have to get somebody to drive you there or would you have to have a car, or did they have a bus?
Roxie Bryson: To high school, not in them days. They didn’t have anything when I was going to school.
Michael Cooke: Oh, when you were going to school-
Roxie Bryson: Later on, they did. They had a bus going to Christiansburg to high school and things like that.
Michael Cooke: So, if they had had a bus, do you think more people would have went?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, yeah, maybe.
Michael Cooke: But because they didn’t have one, that limited how many people would go or could go?

Keywords: Christiansburg, Virginia; Harriet Claytor; Ms. Harriet; Roanoke, Virginia; school

Subjects: Education, secondary

Partial Transcript: Roxie Bryson: Yeah, ‘cause my daughter, she went after she went to public school.
Michael Cooke: What was her name?
Roxie Bryson: Caroline Bryson.
Michael Cooke: So, she went to Christiansburg [Industrial] Institute?
Roxie Bryson: Um-hm. That’s right.
Michael Cooke: Did she graduate?
Roxie Bryson: I don’t think so. No, she didn’t graduate.
Michael Cooke: But she did go?
Roxie Bryson: She went.
Michael Cooke: She went there. Do you have any other children?
Roxie Bryson: No, I have a granddaughter, but they lived in Big Hill for twelve years.
Michael Cooke: They weren’t even in the area?
Roxie Bryson: No, they were not.

Keywords: Christiansburg Industrial Institute; daughter; public school

Subjects: Christiansburg Industrial Institute; Education Opportunities

Partial Transcript: Michael Cooke: Okay. Okay, let’s see. What kind of jobs did people have in this area when you were growing up? Did they work in factories or did they work many on the farms?
Roxie Bryson: That farming is all I know.
Michael Cooke: Did people work in the mines?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, my husband worked in the mines, but didn’t get nothing from it and hasn’t got nothing from it.
Michael Cooke: What was your husband’s name again?
Roxie Bryson: Fred Bryson.
Michael Cooke: Where did he work in the mine?
Roxie Bryson: In West Virginia.
Michael Cooke: Oh, did he commute back and forth?
Roxie Bryson: No, he went for it. He married me in West Virginia, and did the mining in West Virginia.
Michael Cooke: So, you lived in West Virginia for a while?
Roxie Bryson: He did-
Michael Cooke: He did.
Roxie Bryson: Not me.
Michael Cooke: And he met you in West Virginia or here?
Roxie Bryson: Here. He had a sister over in the hollow.
Michael Cooke: Oh, so was he was just simply working there and then had relatives in this area?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, but he had quit the mine then. When he come here, he was from Des Moines, Iowa when he come here.
Michael Cooke: Oh, so he wasn’t even from this area?
Roxie Bryson: Unh-uh.
Michael Cooke: But he had relatives here, though?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: That’s interesting. How did he end up being born in Des Moines, Iowa and having relatives here? I’m trying to figure that one out.
Roxie Bryson: I don’t know. That’s the way it was.
Michael Cooke: [Laughs] Had his parents mined in Iowa?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, his sisters lived in Iowa.
Michael Cooke: And they were part of a mining operation here maybe?
Roxie Bryson: No, they had nothing just worked a job [inaudible 8:39], I guess.

Keywords: Des Moines, Iowa; factories; farm work; farming; jobs; mines; mining

Subjects: Agriculture; Coal mines and mining

Partial Transcript: Michael Cooke: I see. When you were growing up, was there a good relationship between the Whites and the Blacks in this area? Did any whites live in this area? Or nearby?
Roxie Bryson: I don’t think so. Some might have lived in here a little while but not much. But we all got along all right. Plenty of them up here now.
Michael Cooke: So, a number of whites live in Kirk’s Hollow now?
Roxie Bryson: That’s right.
Michael Cooke: But at the time you were growing up, there were very few of them?
Roxie Bryson: There wasn’t any.
Michael Cooke: None at all? Okay.
Roxie Bryson: I don’t think. But people, they ran houses later on. After I got older, a few whites come up here and rent and go on back. Now they’re staying for good.
Michael Cooke: It doesn’t make no difference now with them. Well, that’s interesting. Let’s see, were there any problems with the Klan or Klan type organizations in this area?
Roxie Bryson: No.
Michael Cooke: Were there any incidents between a Black and a white that was really bad-
Roxie Bryson: Unh-uh.
Michael Cooke: You know, a fight, or a killing or murdering connected to their race?
Roxie Bryson: No. Unh-uh.
Michael Cooke: Nothing like that happened?
Roxie Bryson: No.
Michael Cooke: Nothing bad happened?
Roxie Bryson: Unh-uh.

Keywords: Klan; race relations

Subjects: Race Relations

Partial Transcript: Michael Cooke: That’s good. Okay. Why do you think so many blacks have left this area?
Roxie Bryson: I don’t know. They want to go to get work to do, I guess.
Michael Cooke: So, there’s not much work in the area for younger people?
Roxie Bryson: Unh-uh. No not enough around here, as far as I know. But, in Roanoke, [Virginia] and different places there’s work for people to do. But ain’t nothing in Shawsville.
Michael Cooke: Very few factories or anything to do.
Roxie Bryson: It ain’t nothing in Shawsville.
Michael Cooke: No factories at all in Shawsville?
Roxie Bryson: Unh-uh.
Michael Cooke: Was there any factories or mines or anything in the Shawsville area at one time?
Roxie Bryson: Unh-uh. Not that I know of. No, there wasn’t nothing like that.
Michael Cooke: So, more or less, people just lived in this area, did a little farming, that’s about it.
Roxie Bryson: That’s right.
Michael Cooke: So, I guess when farming became more and more a bigger operation, the smaller farmers might not have been able to make it.
Roxie Bryson: Oh, excuse me.
Michael Cooke: Hold on. [Inaudible 11:11] I’m too big. [Laughs] I need to lose some weight if anything. Could Blacks own a lot of property in this area?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, they owned it all. As far as I know, they owned all of the land in this area.
Michael Cooke: How long do you think people have been landowners in this area? Right after the Civil War or some time after?
Roxie Bryson: I imagine so, yeah.
Michael Cooke: So, as long as you can remember, they’ve always owned a lot of land?
Roxie Bryson: That’s right.
Michael Cooke: Did your father own a lot of land?
Roxie Bryson: No, he didn’t own no lot. He owned right much two old way back over yonder in the hollow.
Michael Cooke: Several acres?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, at least that much.

Keywords: farming; migration; property; Shawsville, Virginia

Subjects: Work Opportunities

Partial Transcript: Michael Cooke: Okay let me ask, after you finished working and going to school, how did people entertain themselves when they didn’t have nothing to do?
Roxie Bryson: They had nothing to do. I mean, no entertainment. Nothing but from house to house and talk, that’s all. Conversations, that’s all I know.
Michael Cooke: A lot of conversations?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: What about dances or did anybody specialize in music? Did people play instruments?
Roxie Bryson: No. No.
Michael Cooke: Banjos?
Roxie Bryson: No. They might have had a few at school after the year passed on by, dances and things like that but not many. There wasn’t none dances that I know.
Michael Cooke: If you had to go shop, to get some meat or some food, where would you go to do your shopping?
Roxie Bryson: Over in Shawsville.
Michael Cooke: You’d simply walk across, over the [U.S. Route] 460. Was [U.S. Route] 460 always there or was that something fairly new?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, I don’t know what year it was always there, over there, 460. But you called it Kirk Hollow all the time, and it’s still there.
Michael Cooke: So, you’d just walk, just right back up the hollow and then you’d go shop?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, back down that way.
Michael Cooke: For instance, when you didn’t have a lot of money, would the merchants give you credit?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah. And eggs and stuff was real cheap. Then, you could get a dozen eggs—I mean, you couldn’t get no whole lot, but you could get one thing or something with eggs and things people trade in with for their groceries.
Michael Cooke: So people would trade produce for groceries?
Roxie Bryson: That’s right. Or for instance, if you had something, instead of giving them money you might give them something else?
Roxie Bryson: That’s right, give them the eggs.
Michael Cooke: Okay, and so people did that a lot?
Roxie Bryson: Yes, sir
Michael Cooke: You said your father did some butchering. Did he trade meat for things?
Roxie Bryson: No, he didn’t trade nothing. He just brought it home if it didn’t sell.
Michael Cooke: Whatever didn’t sell, y’all ate, right?
Roxie Bryson: That’s right.
Michael Cooke: So y’all ate reasonably well, I guess, with him being a butcher?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah. People raised a lot of hog meat, so Papa raised one or two he would kill a year.
Michael Cooke: He killed one or two a year?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: So, that left a good amount of meat?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: Okay, let’s see. Were there any black businesses?
Roxie Bryson: Unh-uh.
Michael Cooke: Convenience stores?
Roxie Bryson: Unh-uh. No, nothing but about two stores over there.
Michael Cooke: Were they owned by Whites or Blacks?
Roxie Bryson: By white.
Michael Cooke: So, some whites owned stores in the hollow?
Roxie Bryson: No, they didn’t own it. Yeah, I guess they did. Yeah, some of them owned it over there. But no colored people didn’t even work down there.
Michael Cooke: What could you get at those stores?
Roxie Bryson: Flour, and meal, sugar, and coffee and all like that.
Michael Cooke: Could you get liquor?
Roxie Bryson: No.
Michael Cooke: No liquor. [Laughs]
Roxie Bryson: That just come out here today, liquor and beer and stuff like that.
Michael Cooke: You couldn’t get liquor or beer.
Roxie Bryson: No. They had nothing like that over there.
Michael Cooke: [Laughs] Okay, but they, for instance, if you had a headache and you wanted to get some powders or aspirin-
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, that’s right. You could get that.
Michael Cooke: You could get that?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: So, you did have some conveniences?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: So, I mean, you don’t have to walk all the way down the street to the supermarket or someplace.
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, that’s where we had to go. We have to head over there. It’s down the road. You passed by it when you come through Christiansburg.
Michael Cooke: Uh-huh. Was it an open air market? Or covered market, sometime-
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, it was just a store is all there. But now, it’s called a supermarket.
Michael Cooke: Do you remember some of the Whites who owned the stores?
Roxie Bryson: Mr. King, Mr. Gardner, must’ve owned, and Mr. Sisson, I believe it was. Yeah, Mr. Sisson and Mr. Gardner, they owned the store-
Michael Cooke: Do you remember their first names?
Roxie Bryson: No, I don’t. I don’t remember what their name was.
Michael Cooke: Everybody called them Mr. Sisson or Mr. Gardner, so that’s what everybody knew them as. That explains that.

Keywords: beer; convenience stores; dances; eggs; entertainment; groceries; grocery shopping; Kirk Hollow; liquor; medicine; shopping; supermarket

Subjects: Grocery; Social Life

Partial Transcript: Michael Cooke: Were there any black social clubs like the Odd Fellows or the Household of Ruth or—let’s see what else—Independent Order of St. Luke? Was that-
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, it was St. Luke in the hollow. I belonged to it for a long time.
Michael Cooke: Oh, you did?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah. And they cut it out and sent a little bit of money back, and that was it.
Michael Cooke: Well, before they cut it out though, there were a lot of people or a number of people-
Roxie Bryson: It wasn’t too many, about six or seven.
Michael Cooke: But that’s a-
Roxie Bryson: That was the group.
Michael Cooke: That was the group?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: Do you remember the people that were a part of your group?
Roxie Bryson: Mamie Noah.
Michael Cooke: Mamie Noah?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, and let me see. Ella Staples.
Michael Cooke: Okay.
Roxie Bryson: And...I forgot the rest of them, but that was about all of them. Myself and Frances. My sister, she belonged to it, but she was away, and she send the money here.
Michael Cooke: Oh, she was-
Roxie Bryson: I paid it [inaudible 18:13].
Michael Cooke: Where was she away at?
Roxie Bryson: At Philadelphia.
Michael Cooke: Oh, so she went all the way up North, huh? [Laughs]
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: Did they also have another organization called the Household of Ruth? Have you ever heard of that?
Roxie Bryson: No, I-
Michael Cooke: They had the St. Lukes here?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, they did-
Michael Cooke: So you were a bona fide St. Luke?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: What did you all do when you—maybe this is a secret and I’m not supposed to know this—but what did y’all do when y'all were members of the St. Luke?
Roxie Bryson: Well, we had a meeting and go to the church and had a meeting over there. That’s about all we did.
Michael Cooke: It was social?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: People got to socializing with one another.
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, that’s what it was.
Michael Cooke: Were there other things, too? Did you get any benefits out of—for instance—if you got sick or something.
Roxie Bryson: Got enough.
Michael Cooke: You got some money.
Roxie Bryson: A little bit, not much.
Michael Cooke: Not much.
Roxie Bryson: Yes.

Keywords: Black organizations; Ella Staples; Frances; Household of Ruth; Independent Order of St. Luke; Mamie Noah; Odd Fellows; social clubs; St. Luke

Subjects: Shawsville, Virginia; Social Organizations

Partial Transcript: Michael Cooke: What kind of work did you do?
Roxie Bryson: Who, me?
Michael Cooke: Yeah.
Roxie Bryson: I worked in restaurant and the post office. That was my jobs, those two jobs. Worked at the post office for about twenty years.
Michael Cooke: Oh, so you were a federal employee?
Roxie Bryson: No, just old janitor, didn’t make nothing. And that wasn’t nothing, a hundred dollars every two weeks or two hundred dollars. No, it was one, not two. A hundred dollars every two weeks, that’s all.
Michael Cooke: So when did you stop working?
Roxie Bryson: May before last.
Michael Cooke: Oh, so you just finished work?
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, and I didn’t get sick, but the woman didn’t do right. So I couldn’t....
Michael Cooke: Just gonna say, this is not worth it anymore.
Roxie Bryson: Unh-uh.
Michael Cooke: When you worked at a restaurant, how many years did you work at a restaurant?
Roxie Bryson: I don’t know, two or three, four or five, six or seven.
Michael Cooke: What restaurants did you work at?
Roxie Bryson: I don’t know. Down here at...at...oh shoot. I worked over here at this one, but they closed down. I don’t know what’s the name of it now. What’s the name of that one? I can’t think of the name of it, but I know...
Michael Cooke: Don’t worry about it. We know you worked at a local restaurant.
Roxie Bryson: Right.
Michael Cooke: So it was in Shawsville. So that’s all that matters. It’s just a little more detail. It’s not all that important anyway.
Roxie Bryson: And I worked down at Elliston and Big Hill at the restaurants.
Michael Cooke: Did they allow blacks to eat in the restaurants?
Roxie Bryson: Yes.
Michael Cooke: Could they sit in the-
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, anywhere they wanted. After I got—and you know—then I could-
Michael Cooke: Well, this is later, I guess.
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, it was.
Michael Cooke: What about before they had integration before they said that black people couldn’t be discriminated against? Did they allow black people to sit then?
Roxie Bryson: I don’t know whether they did or not because that wasn’t my time.

Keywords: Big Hill; Elliston, Virginia; pay; post office; restaurant; salary; Shawsville, Virginia; work opportunities

Subjects: Segregation; Work Opportunities

Partial Transcript: Michael Cooke: Okay. Let’s see. Was there any entertainment? Was there a theater or anything in town in Shawsville?
Roxie Bryson: Unh-uh, never had that.
Michael Cooke: So, if you wanted to go see a theater or a show or movie, where would you go?
Roxie Bryson: Christiansburg.
Michael Cooke: You’d go all the way to Christiansburg?
Roxie Bryson: Yes.
Michael Cooke: Did people go quite often?
Roxie Bryson: Not from down here. And there might not have been none then at that time. Might just have been the regular have that.

Keywords: Christiansburg, Virginia; Shawsville, Virginia; theater

Subjects: Social Life

Partial Transcript: Michael Cooke: Okay, let me make sure I got...Let me ask you this, were there certain areas in this area that you would, as a Black person, you would be afraid to go to? Would you want to go to places like Elliston or Ironto or places like that? Were there ever any problems with some areas where they just didn’t like blacks particularly? Did Black people from this area stay away from certain areas?
Roxie Bryson: No, no. Not that I know of.
Michael Cooke: So, they didn’t have any problems in this area.
Roxie Bryson: Unh-uh.
Michael Cooke: Okay. I’m trying to think of something else here, but I think we have-
Roxie Bryson: I hope all that ain’t on this, but-
Michael Cooke: Oh! Some of the questions are kind of connected with one another. Like some of the questions, there might be several questions just connected to one question. For instance, describe relations with Whites. Were there incidents of a racial nature or were there Klan activities? So, some of the questions are just kind of-
Roxie Bryson: Yeah.
Michael Cooke: Yeah. Part of one big question.

Keywords: Klan; Race Relations

Subjects: Montgomery County (Va.); Race Relations

Partial Transcript: Roxie Bryson: I hope it don’t scare me when I see it or hear it again. [Laughter]
Michael Cooke: Oh, it won’t happen. Thank you for your cooperation.
Roxie Bryson: Yeah, you’re welcome. I did the best I could.
Michael Cooke: Oh, yeah. You let me know about what’s going on. That’s what you said you would, and you did. Thank you.
Roxie Bryson: You got it.
[End of interview]