Atchafalaya Basin People: Chapter 39

DATE:                        January 4, 1996 

INTERVIEWER:      Jim Delahoussaye

LOCATIONS:           At Ida Daigle’s house at Oxford Loop, Oxford, St. Mary Parish, Louisiana

COOPERATORS:   Ida Sauce Daigle

 Continued from Chapter 38

 JD:      When y’all: were, uh, I want to ask you this.  You knew the old people pretty well, you knew…you knew, uh, you knew Claiborne Mayon and you knew uh, Mire Mayon.   Why do you suppose people got on houseboats in the first place? 

 Ida:     Well, these people here, like Nonc Mire, had a houseboat, he lived on a houseboat.  My grandpa lived on a houseboat.  Claiborne, yah.  You see, he used to do this all the time.  [make shrimp nets] He’d sell em for a dollar and a half a piece. 

 JD:      Fanny?  Fanny Mayon? Fanny would knit nets, eh?

 Ida:     Fanny, yeah.  She…she’s the one showed me how to do it.  My momma had a family and she didn’t pay too much mind what I wanted.   My momma was a good person,

JD:      You uh, you say that Claiborne Mayon lived on a…on a campboat.  Did he live, you think, all his life on a campboat, or not?

 Ida:     No.  Uhuh.  When they were raisin their family they used to live on Bayou Long.  Bayou Long, in a great big house. 

 JD:      Now, Bayou Long, you talking about Bayou Long…?

 Ida:     The Big Bayou Long, the other side the levee [now], yeah.  Ok, well, that’s where they used to live.  And my grandpa, he had a big, big house there.   And they had houses…houses, rows of houses all along there.  Lookted like a town.  All along.  And uh, but he didn’t live in a houseboat all the time.  He raised his family on the bank.  Yeah, with cattles and hogs and, you know, chickens.

 JD:      A farm?  They had a farm?

 Ida:     It’s not a farm.  It’s just a big, big piece of land he had on his own.  Jim, we’d be fixed up, with the land that my grandma and grandpa had.  Both sides, and with Jesse’s grandpa and grandma we’d be fixed up if people wouldn’t a cheated us for it. 

 JD:      That’s what I heard.  EJ told me some of that.  Uh, why, then…when, when Claiborne and Fanny did move onto a houseboat, why do you think they did?  I’m interested in that.

 Ida:     Yah.  Because we was all living on the bayou.  My momma and daddy was livin on the bayou, in campboats.  And they wanted to follow them, because they was getting old.  And they followed us all over. They had…a, a Solivan Duval, that was the son-in-law, and Blaise Sauce, that was their son-in-law, and they had…uh, I don’t remember now, I know he was a…a, he was a Carline.   George…George Carline, that was his…that was their son-in-law. 

 JD:      Claiborne’s son-in-law?

 Ida:     Claiborne, yeah. 

 JD:      So, George Carline must have married one of these women then [referring to the chart of Claiborne’s children].

 Ida:     George Carline married Lydia.  And they had a daughter, and two sons.  The name of the daughter was…was uh…let’s see Dorothy and one of em was, Junior and the other one was Burl.  Burl.  Three…three…three kids they had. 

 JD:      OK.  So, you sayin that Claiborne had these son-in-laws who were all on campboats. 

 Ida:     All on campboats, they were all livin on campboats.  And they [the old people] were getting old in that big house.  And they moved in a campboat to follow the kids, you see, wherever they’d go.  And, but, when he took sick…

 JD:      Claiborne?

 Ida:     Yeah.  when he took sick, he had a stroke, he took it on Lil Pigeon. On the lower end, on this side of the bayou.  I remember that good.  He took sick, he was settin down on the porch.  It was hot, it was in the summer.  And all, and he suddenly keeled over.  They picked him up and they brought him to Morgan City.  And he lived about three days, and then he died.

 JD:      He died in Morgan City?

 Ida:     Yeah, he died in Morgan City.

 JD:      Why do you suppose they buried him at The Canal?  At the…

 Ida:     Because his family was buried there.  Oh, he had a lot of…he had a lot of…it’s his daddy who had seven wives, and they had… they had kids with all of his wifes.  I can’t name em all, maybe I can name some, but not all.

 JD:      Wait, Claiborne Mayon’s daddy…his daddy, had seven wives?

 Ida:     Seven wives. 

 JD:      And, and, kids with all of em.  They all died?  I mean they all died?  No, but I mean the seven wives?  But he didn’t have more than one…?

 Ida:     The seven wifes.  He’d marry one and they died, he marry another one…until he had…he didn’t have em all at one time. [laughs]. But you know, seven wifes, that’s what he had.  And he had kids with all those…those woman. 

 JD:      And all those kids are all named Mayon and they all have different names.

 Ida:     Mayon, and some of em is named all “Claiy...”.   There’s Claiborne, Cleo, Cleomere, and that’s…

 JD:      Is that where uh, where Neg got his name?  Cleophus? Neg?

 Ida:     Yah.  Neg, Cleo.  They had Cleo and Cleophus, that wasn’t the same, no, that was two. 

 JD:      But…Neg’s name…your brother’s name is supposed to be Cleophus. 

 Ida:     Yeah, but it was two, you see?  Clopha and…and…and Cleo, that was two.  You understand?  And they had Cleone, Claibert, and, I know what I’m talking about but I can’t…I don’t remember the names.

 JD:      I hear you.  So all…you talking about the children they had with those seven wives?  They were all Cleo something?

 Ida:     Yeah.  They were all “Clays”.  You see Mire?  The name I had give you a while ago?  Well, that was one of his brothers too.  Dat was from another woman. 

 JD:      Yeah, that was one of Claiborne’s brothers.   And so Claiborne was one, and Mire…now Mire wasn’t a “Clay”. 

 Ida:     No, he wasn’t a Clay, him.  But they had Claibert…they had Claibert, and Claiborne, and Cleo, and…another one too.  We used to call him Rap all the time, and I can’t remember his name.  But I can’t remember his name. 

 JD:      Um, well, that was interesting.  You were talking about something else but when you said he had seven wives, I had to kind of write something down.

 Ida:     Well, I say, and had kids with all seven.  They had daughters too, but, I don’t know…the daughters must of died before I was big enough to remember. 

 JD:      Well, you knew Mire because of what your daddy [meant husband] did with him, all that logging with him. 

 Ida:     Yeah, Jesse worked with him.  He was old, you know, when Jesse worked with him, but he was just a foreman, like, he worked mens. 

 JD:      Um, so they got on a houseboat in order to follow the kids.

 Ida:     To follow the kids, yeah.  Cause they was old, you see?  And, and they had needed to follow the kids, and they kids was all over the world.  Campboats and things. 

 JD:      What did Fanny do after he died?  After Claiborne died? 

 Ida:     Uh, she…she was all crippled.  And she was blind.

 JD:      Crippled and blind, crippled with arthritis or something?

 Ida:     Arthuritis.  Her hand was all crippled. But, when she’d hear us talk she could tell it was us.  She was, I believe, 98, 99, she was old old old.

 JD:      She went to live with somebody after he died?

 Ida:     Yeah.  Uncle Alvin.  She lived…she moved out…they moved her out of the campboat to go with him [Alvin] after he [Claiborne] died.

 JD:      He was on the bank?

 Ida:     No no.  On a campboat.  All of us was in campboats.  Very seldom that you’d see a house.  It was all campboats.  They’d tie along the bayou there, that whole Bayou Long…I mean, uh…whatever [place].  They didn’t have but two house on Lil Pigeon.  It was Edward’s [Couvilleir] momma and daddy had a house, and then they had a house way above, in a big curve, like.  And that was like…who had that, now, uh…Mr. Charlie Acair.  He had a house there.  That’s the only two house they had.  And it was full of people, but they would stay all in campboats. 

 JD:      Now, if uh, Claiborne and them raised their whole family on…on the bank ...in a house on the bank…on Bayou Long.  Uh, but the kids, course Rosalie married Blaise, but then you had…you had Alvin, and Ivy and Lydia and Elaine and Olivia and Dot…

 Ida:     They were all married, you see? 

 JD:      But did you say…Alvin and…at least Alvin…and you said the others too, probably, went to campboats. 

 Ida:     Yeah.  Uncle Alvin was livin on a campboat, uncle Boyer was living on a campboat…that was uh, uh…Ivy.  And my Aunt Lydia was living on a campboat  with George Carline.  And, as far as Olivia I don’t know, I believe she was livin in a house along Bayou Long somewhere, I don’t remember.  We used to go visit her, but I don’t remember, I was little. 

 JD:      But we know Elaine was on a campboat because she was the one who was being mistreated by Henri.

 Ida:     Yah. She was living in a campboat.

 JD:      My question is…these people were all raised on land.  Why did they get on campboats. 

 Ida:     Gawd knows, Jim.  You see, uh, the Bayou Long was a big, big place.  They had stores on there…

 JD:      Oh, you could reach them just by water?

 Ida:     Yeah.  You could reach that…you could walk along the bayou, you can visit everybody and all and they…it…it was houses.   But they had a lot of house that I don’t know who it was.   But I know two house that I know, but the other house, I can’t name em.  But its…she used to make us bonnets when we were little.   And she’d scare us, she’d say “I put this bonnet on your head, and if you take it off I’m gone nail it on it”.  And so we didn’t take it off.

 JD:      Ohhh.  Who told you this?

 Ida:     This woman I’m talking about there.  She was a…I’m tryin to remember.  It’ll come.  I remember that woman.  She was a madewife. 

 JD:      A midwife, eh?

 Ida:     Momma and Daddy had the camp tied, because she was pregnant for Neg.  That’s the farthest I can remember.  Now, you know that’s far, to remember, that we had out camp tied in front of her house.  In case momma would fall sick, because…so she could come tend to Momma.  And the sun was hot, and she said…made us some bonnets, put it on our heads, she said “Yall take em off I’m gone nail em”.  [laughs]

 JD:      But you see, these people, they went from living on land to living on campboats, and I’m trying to figure out why they didn’t stay living on land.

 Ida:     I dunno, but all they land, it was they property. 

 JD:      Why didn’t they…?

 Ida:     Why they didn’t put the property on the kids’s name, or something.  But no, a stranger took over there Jim.  The stranger took over. 

 JD:      You think it was for taxes?  You think they didn’t pay taxes?

 Ida:     I think it was for taxes, myself.

 JD:      They didn’t pay taxes?  They just…

 Ida:     The Sauces, say…the Sauce’s land, Uncle Joe…you know, Jack’s daddy.  You know Jack Sauce?  OK, well, his daddy.   They say he was the last one to pay tax.  And why, after he died, we got a letter here.  We got a letter.  We got to go to Morgan City.  That’s a place you could find everything, if you go to the courthouse in Morgan City.  Yeah, I know.  I’m not thinking, I’m sure.  Because they called us over there and we went.  Jim, they got books over there that thick, everything.  And they said, let’s see, I had the name on my tongue a while ago before you got here. The man that said he had paid tax, it was one of my daddy’s cousins.  On the Sauce’s land now, I’m not talking about the Mayons.   I talking about the Sauce.  He say he paid tax.  OK. He’s got a big, big concern going on this land, yere.  He’s got camping houses, he’s got stores, he’s got…

JD:      You not talking bout T-Man Bailey?

Ida:     No no.  I’m not talking about T-Man Bailey.  That’s a different…T-Man Bailey, that’s on the Daigle side.  This is the Sauce.  And let’s see, if I could only remember…I had…I named em all while I was by myself a while ago.  Uh, shucks, I know he said that he had paid the tax [?]m and Uncle Joe say he’s lying.  He’s lyin, and that’s what we wanted to go…to straighten out the tax, you see?  And they called us, they all sent us each a letter.  We went to the courthouse, and uh, in Morgan City.  That’s where all the papers is at, it’s in Morgan City.  They got stacks of books like that [tall].  On the Sauces, on the Mayons, and different…you know?  And then when they start saying the man that was paying tax on the land, I hollered, I knew he was lyin.  I hollered.  I say “I know he’s lyin”.  HE had went…he knew we was comin over there…he went first.  And he signed that he had paid the tax, and he’s lyin.  Uncle Joe Sauce paid the tax.  My daddy’s brother, Jack…his daddy was my daddy’s brother.  He was Joseph Sauce.

 JD:      He died in, uh, in 1931?

 Ida:     Yeah believe so, he died while we was all at the lake, for sure. 

 JD:      Yeah.  I have that.  I don’t know if you can see that…

 Ida:     Was on the cross.

 JD:      Yeah, that’s what was on his cross.  Died, what is it?  September …no, yeandied September 27, 1931.  Mr. C. Mayon, born…what is that?  Something 10^th, 1859.

 Ida:     He was a Sauce, the one I’m talking about. 

 JD:      Oh, a Sauce?

 Ida:     Yah, Joseph Sauce…Jack’s brother.

 JD:      Oh, this is Claiborne Mayon I’m talking about.  And this one right here is Fanny Mayon, that’s what her cross looks like.  Just to show you what her cross looks like.

 Ida:     But, this, what I’m talking about is the Sauces, now.  Because, you see, uh, he…he died when we was out there.  Well, right after he moved away from the…the lake.  Now, the campboat that I was talking about that I had, he had it.  He had it.  He wanted it.  He wanted our campboat, because he knew he had a good one if he’d get ours, and we traded…for his, in other words we had made a house, with the cabin, we had enlarge it though, and we made a house with the cabin, took it off the barge, made a house with the cabin.  And we traded [for] his because Jesse wanted to go back on campboats.   We traded our house for his campboat.  But his campboat wasn’t nuttin.  Rotten, in no time it was rotten.  And that’s the man I’m talking about.  And he…that…that’s where we had land, they got oil rigs and all on that land.

 JD:      Did you like to live on a campboat?

 Ida:     Ohhh, I’d like that yet.  I’m old, but I sure enjoy myself on a campboat. 

 JD:      Everybody seemed to like it?  Everybody?

 Ida:     Yeah.  Jim, it’s so handy.  On the campboat.  Of course, maybe not no more.  We had our own bathroom on the back end of our campboat.  Take a bath in there.  We’d use it in there.  And it was right there by the water.  It didn’t get no smell, no nothing.   And it was much handier.  You’d go in the bayou, rinse your mop good…I’d never have a dirty house, me!   It was clean all the time.  Because whenever I see dirt, the water was right there.   Handy. 

 JD:      You didn’t have electricity though. 

 Ida:     No, but we had them uh, uh, you know them big gas lantern? 

 JD:      Gas lantern?

 Ida:     Them big gas lantern.  Man, that shine better than them bulbs.

 JD:      Oh, y’all: had gas lanterns?  You put mantles in em and pump it up and…I didn’t know y’all: had those.

 Ida:     Yah.  We had that.  You talk about shine! 

 JD:      I thought all y’all: had were kerosene lamps.

 Ida:     No, uhuh.  Not just kerosene.  We had kerosene lamps, I still do.  But we’d use…when we wanted to do something like do the knitting, like me I wanted to knit [nets].  We’d put that lantern on…that gas lamp.  She! You could see a lil bitty thing!  That shining.  We had one on the porch, and we had one for the inside the house.  And, I had another one, it was, just like a kerosene lamp, big old tank…I could’a put kerosene in it, if I wanted.  But it was hooked up to put gas and the mantle, in it.  And I had one like that.  The globe was this long [two feet tall].  Big, long globe.  I believe Agnes still got one.

 JD:      Where did y’all: get gas for that?

 Ida:     Eh?  Well, we’d buy gas.  The boats would bring us gas out there.

 JD:      You could use the same gas as [for motors]?

 Ida:     No.  Use the white gas.  They’d bring us a small drum of white gas for the lights, and bring them big drums for the boats.

 JD:      55-gallon drums for the boats?

 Ida:     Yeah.  For the boats. We was well fixed up.  You’d go outside at night; it was just like you go outside under my lights over here.

 JD:      You’d hang it on the porch?

 Ida:     We’d hang it on the porch.  And the big old stern wheel boats used to pass too, those big old boat.

 JD:      You would see those?

 Ida:     I guess so, we’d see!  Big old tows, they used to tow timbers with that.

 JD:      Is that what they did?  Tow timbers?

 Ida:     And they’d pass with that.  We’d hang…I’d hang two lights!  Two of those gas lights, one on each side the campboat.  Make sure that they could see it. 

 JD:      Yall were…uh…how could they hit you?  You were…you were in the canal?  No?

 Ida:     No, we was in the bayou, but the bayou was like…like a river, you see.  Sometime, you see, they would curve in…they were towing a big boom of timbers, you see ., and when they’d make a curve like that, they’d pass right by the bank.  And I was scared, me.  I’d hang the light …believe me.  Jesse say “I swear, if they hit me, they gone buy me another camp”. 

 JD:      That’s too late then, though, huh?

 Ida:     That’s for sure.  [laughs].  Because I say, look, they ain’t gone destroy what I got…to pass with them logs. 

 JD:      They used to tow those logs?  They didn’t push that?  They towed…?

 Ida:     They did.  They towed em.  Yeah. And when they’d make a curve, with that Jim.  It’s not just one or two, it was, in other words, strings of em.  Strings of logs.  They had to because sometimes the current would shift, you see, and they had to have something to pull that in.  Big old…

 JD:      There used to be a boat that they tell me used to go up and down…used to carry…I don’t think it pulled logs, I think it carried other stuff. 

 Ida:     They used to carry things, yeah, around Christmas time.

 JD:      There was something called the Kurzweg.  Ever hear of that boat?

 Ida:     No, I don’t…maybe I did but it’s been so long…

 JD:      Nobody else has either, I’ve asked other people and they never heard of it either. 

 Ida:     They used to have one…you know what we used to call it?  The Ball Boat.   It was a great big one!  And they’d pack and throw candy, throw dolls, throw lil trucks, they’d throw lil boats…all kind of things to them lil kids. 

 JD:      They did?  Did y’all:…did the kids go out and meet the boats?  Or something like that?

 Ida:     No!  They threw it…they’d pass close and they’d go slow, slow, you know?  And they’d throw it on the bank.

 JD:      Now, who was it that would be throwing all that stuff?

 Ida:     Bunch of people on there.

 JD:      Riding?  Just riding, as passengers I guess, or…?

 Ida:     No, they were doin that for the poor people.  They were doing that…and they’d throw bags of clothes for some, and… Yeah, they’d throw different things.  Like charity, I guess, around Christmas they’d do that. That was in Lil Pigeon.   Lil Pigeon, that was a bayou, you wouldn’t believe how wide that was.

 JD:      Big one huh?  It was bigger than Big Pigeon?

 Ida:     Oh yeah!  They could pass about three wideness of them boats.  And nothing didn’t touch.  It was wide.  And bad weather would come?  My Daddy would get scared.  Because…he would tell Momma…”Huh, I like this big bayou when it’s hot” but he say “I sure don’t like it to know when there’s a storm or somethin comin”. 

 JD:      It would make waves, the waves would get big?

 Ida:     Yeah.

 JD:      And you liked it when it was hot, why? 

 Ida:     It was cool.

 JD:      The breeze?

 Ida:     You had screen doors and all.  We’d leave that [open], boy, them curtains do that [wave] at night.  Anyhow, you wouldn’t need no air condition or nuttin in there, no!  You had to pull a blanket, yeah, before daylight.   But oftentime Momma used to say that.  “I don’t know what I’d do without this fresh air”.  I say “You do just like the rest” I say “You’d smother” [laughs]. 

 JD:      Well, listen, Ida, I want to come back and talk to you but I don’t want to wear you out all at one time. 

 Ida:     Well, I’ll be studying about it, and some things probly I’ll remember.  But right now I’m blank. 

 JD:      You…you not blank!  You gave me a lot of stuff to do, to talk about.

 Ida:     You know, I think about all this thing, me, Jim.  I think about all this.  I go to bed at night and think…the good times, dat we used to have when we was young.  They had…on Lil Pigeon they had a lil dance hall, and…

 JD:      They did?  On Little Pigeon?

 Ida:     Yah.  Used to go and…yah…for the kids, you know, mostly for kids.

 JD:      On the bank?  It was on the bank. And who used to play music?

 Ida:     Eh?   My daddy used to play the fiddle.   And my uncle used to play the guitar. 

 JD:      What uncle was that?

 Ida:     That…Si Aucoin.   He was married to a Sauce, married to one of my daddy’s sister.   Her name was Anna.

 JD:      Oh, Aucoin?  Anna was her name?          Well, another Aucoin was married to one of your daddy’s sisters…no that was Chouki.  Do you remember what…now, that…that was a woman.  And do you remember what her real name was, or was that her real name? 

 Ida:     I believe it was Florence…I’m not sure…but I believe it was Florence, her name.   But I knew her by Aunt Chouki, me, all the time.

 JD:      What did Anna’s husband’s name…was it…Aucoin…?

 Ida:     Phillip.  Phillip.  Phillip Aucoin.

 JD:      That was…that was Chouki’s husband?

 Ida:     Yeah.

 JD:      But you said Anna was married to a musician who was also an Aucoin?  Did you say that?

 Ida:     Yah, uh, that…that’s uh, uh, Si…Si Aucoin.

 JD:      And he was a guitar, huh?

 Ida:     Yeah, he…he used to play the guitar.  My daddy used to play the fiddle.  We had…they had a big house, you see, and they were livin on the back end, and they made a lil place for us to dance in the front.

 JD:      They had a house on the bank?

 Ida:     Yeah.  Big house…that house was moved to the Boutte.  After…I don’t know…everybody left from Lil Pigeon, I don’t know why.  They didn’t have a…didn’t have a soul left. 

 JD:      Did it take a long time, or quickly…they moved?

 Ida:     No, they’d move one at the time until they didn’t have…well, the last one moved because they didn’t have nobody there.  And they were the last ones to move. 

 JD:      Yall uh…y’all: would go and dance, and your daddy would play and your uncle would play.  And uh, what kind of dance was it?  What kind of…?

 Ida:     [laughs]  The olden time dance.   French music, and that… maybe you heard about that Shorters dance that they had? 

 JD:      Shorters?

 Ida:     [spelling?] Shorters dance?  I used to dance that. 

 JD:      That was a special kind of dance?

 Ida:     Special kind.   And dance the Charlston.  We’d…I used to Charlston...they’d put me on the bare floor by myself!   Yeah, I used to be a dancer. 

 JD:      So y’all: would waltz, and do the Shorter, and do the…the Charlston…?

 Ida:     Yeah, two step, one step…all kind of them…

 JD:      Two step and one step…that was two different of dances?

 Ida:     Umhm.  Oh yeah.  you had to know how to dance.  And my uncle showed me all this.   My uncle showed me all that, yeah.

 JD:      Which uncle? 

 Ida:     Uncle Si, Si Aucoin.  The guitar player.  My daddy used to play the fiddle.  That’s why Neg can play the fiddle, my daddy showed him.  ..  You ever heard Neg play the fiddle?

 JD:      Never heard him, but I know he had one.

 Ida:     He’s got one, and he played it too.

 JD:      Um, well that’s neat.  Yall would have plenty of young people?  There were plenty of young people around to go and dance? 

 Ida:     Oh Lord!  We used to get a crowd of us.  All young people, you know, there was a bunch on Lil Pigeon, all about the same age, the girls and the boys.

 JD:      Before y’all: were married?

 Ida:     Oh yeah.  Way before I even thought about gettin married.  They had a crab factory there.  I worked at the crab factory. 

 JD:      A crab factory on Lil Pigeon?

 Ida:     Well sure!  I worked at the crab factory.  I make me some money.  ..  Yeah, had a crab factory there.  A store [too].

 JD:      This is the first time I knew about the …

 Ida:     You know who the store was?  I can name you the store.  It was Jim Verret, had that.  Jim Verret, in other words, just like you [name]…but he was a Verret. 

 JD:      And it was on Lil Pigeon on the bank?

 Ida:     On the bank.  He’d buy fish and he’d sell groceries, and he had a crab factory.  He’d buy crabs. 

 JD:      Did he peel crabs, or did he…

 Ida:     He peeled. 

 JD:      He peeled crabs. How did they keep…he must’ve had ice.  Somebody must’ve brought him ice?

 Ida:     Oh yeah.  He had…ah, hot ice. You know hot ice?

 JD:      Dry ice?

 Ida:     Dry ice. 

 JD:      Yall called it hot ice?

 Ida:     Yeah.  We called it hot ice.  He’d buy his crabs…he had a great big old place and he had that surrounded with that hot ice, and he’d put his crates in there with the crabs.  And in the morning he’d get up early and then he’d boil em.   Then, about 8:00 he…he’d blow that whistle [whistles], and we were all ready to go. 

 JD:      Yall would go peel?  Peel crabs?

 Ida:     Yah.  I made high as $26 a day!  That’s what I’m telling you, I’m not crazy Jim

 JD:      How old would you say you were when you were on Lil Pigeon…

 Ida:     About 12, 13…

 JD:      12 or 13, so that would make it, uh, that would be 28…that would be about 1930.  Somewhere in there.  Do you remember very much about the Depression?  They talk a lot about the Depression…

 Ida:     Yes, I did.  We got married in the Depression.  Me and Jesse did.  He was making $1.50 a day.

 JD:      When did y’all: get married?  What date?

 Ida:     We got married July the first, but I don’t remember if it was ’35, or ’33.  It’s one out of the two, I don’t remember.  I got my marriage license, though.   I believe Russell was born around ’35 or ’36, so we was married two years before Russell was born. 

 JD:      So, you could say ’33, then?

 Ida:     Yeah.  July 1^st. In the hot part of the year.  And I worked at that crab factory to buy my wedding dress, my ring…and my hat.

 JD:      You bought your own ring?!

 Ida:     I wanted to.  Jesse was only makin $1.50 a day.

 JD:      Doin what?

 Ida:     Floatin timber.   Deadin…not floatin em…but deadin em.

 JD:      What does that mean?

 Ida:     Deadin em?  That’s for all the sap to go down to when you throw em, they’ll float. 

 JD:      Now, how did they…how did they do that?

 Ida:     They’d go all the way around the tree, and chop.

 JD:      Cut around the tree?

 Ida:     Yeah, cut around the tree.  Then when the water would come up, and then they’d knock em down, see, and they’d float like biscuits on the water.

 JD:      How long did it take from the time that they would deaden em to…

 Ida:     They…they…they…that’s what he was doin when we got married in July.  He was deadening trees.  And I don’t know how long he was deadening before we got married, because he wasn’t around.  He was up the country with Nonc Mire, and uh, he come…he come on the first part of July, maybe…I mean the last part of uh, August. [according to this, it was a year before he came back and they got married???]  He come and seen me and he talked about marrying me then.  I say “At $1.50 a day?” he say “Well, what we gone do” he say “We gone do with what we got” but he say “All I tell you…”  He had that lil house, you see, before he was married.  And uh, he say “We gone live in our own house, no matter what we got, we gone live in our house when we get married” 

 JD:      And where was the house located?

 Ida:     Right there at Blue Point Canal, there.   Momma on one corner, and me on the other.   And uh, I say “Well, that’s fine” but I say “You think we’ll be able to make it” I say “on $1.50 a day?”.  He say “We’ll make it or break it”.

 JD:      But by that time y’all: had moved from Lil Pigeon to the Canal [at Blue Point]. 

 Ida:     Yah, by that time we had moved, but not long before, you see.   Because I had saved me enough money to buy me a dress, buy me the shoes, and buy me the hat, because I was married to [by] a Justice of the Peace, you see.  Because I didn’t have…we didn’t have the money to get married…make a big weddin in church.

 JD:      You bought your own ring too?

 Ida:     I bought my own ring and I still got it too.

 JD:      That’s it right there?

 Ida:     Yeah, it’s all warp but it’s there.  And uh, so, we went…uh uh, I told him, I say “Well” I say “I got enough money saved” I say “To buy my dress, and uh, my slip”.  You know, what I needed.  In other words the whole suit.  ..  “Well” he say “buy it” and he say “whenever I can, if I make enough money, I’m gone return it”  I say “You don’t have to return nothin”.  And I…I wasn’t old, Jim, I was only 13 ½ years old. 

 JD:      13 ½ when y’all: had that conversation?!

 Ida:     I wasn’t old!  And I say “Look” I say “Whatever you do” I say “you want to marry me” but I say “We gone make the best of it”.  ..  I say “I want to get married but I don’t want no breakin up”.  And I was only 13 ½ years old.  You take a girl 13 ½ [now]…I say “Listen, I’m willing to stay in that lil shack you got” I say “No matter what we got” I say “It’s gonna be us [our business], it’s not gonna be to go tell nobody else”.  He say “You got it”. 

 JD:      So, that was in August.

 Ida:     That was in August.  So, we come back…he come back.  He finish.  So, when he come back, I was scrubbin.  I was scrubbin walls in Momma’s house, and scrubbin floors, and cleaning up everything.  He come, I was back of a dresser. And I didn’t know he was in.  I had pulled the dresser [out] and I was stuck back there, I was scrubbin.  And he come, and he caught me like this [put his hands on over her eyes].  I say “Leave me alone, I’m scrubbin, I gone hit you with my scrubbin brush”.  And then he started laughing.  He say “You want to hit me with the brush?” I say “If I couldn’t know who you was” I say “because I did hit Brud like dat, and I’d a hit you too”.  And uh, so, he told me, “Well” he say “It’s a dose I gotta swalla.” But he say “I’m gonna ax you momma and daddy”.  Well, I say “I don’t want to be around here…I don’t want to be around when you gone ax my daddy!”  My momma would’a been willing.  But my daddy.  My daddy lovded me.  Because he knewed I was mistreated by my momma.  I say, “I’m gone” I say “I’m gone in the lake” I say “I’m gone help Monug to make bushes” I said “You go while I’m gone” [laughs].   So, we got in the skiff, me and Monug, push skiff.  We went in the lake and uh, we made some bushes, put em out.  And just before dark, we come on home.  He was just walking out of the house.  And he had axed Momma and Daddy.  And he say “You know what your daddy answered me?” “If you mistreat her, I’ll kill you”.  Because, he say “She works, you don’t have to tell him [her] nuttin. You don’t have to tell her what to do, she see what gotta be done, and she do it”.  He say “Don’t worry” he say “I’m not gone mistreat her” he say “I would ax you to have…if I’d want to mistreat her, I wouldn’t ax you to give her to me.” But he say “I want her and I promise you I ain’t gone mistreat her?” So, when we come back that night, he sat up with me a while, and talk, and place things.  And he told me, he say  “I ax your daddy, but he didn’t fuss” but he say “Your momma didn’t like that!”   I said the one that I thought wasn’t gone…was gone say something…I say, “That’s the one didn’t say nuttin.”  So, after he left, my daddy and my momma was sittin down in the back room, and my daddy called me.  He say “Do you ready to get married”.  I say “Daddy” I say “Yeah, I’m ready to get married”.  He say “You know what the situation of marriage?” I say “Yes, I know”.  He say “You don’t get married today and quit tomorrow”.  He say “That’s forever”.  So, I told…I say “Well, it’s gotta be forever” Got married right there to the courthouse in Franklin.

 JD:      Yall did? Yall came across the lake to Franklin?

 Ida:     We come across the lake.  Got married, went back, my uncle made old clean in the lil house, and he made a dance hall with it. 

 JD:      Who brought you? [to Franklin]

 Ida:     Pinkerman Mendoza brought us.

 JD:      The fishboat man?

 Ida:     Yeah, the fishboat man. He had one of them big fancy bateau with a…with a cabin on it…fancy boat.  And he brought us.  She made me a cake, a weddin cake that big [big and round]. 

 JD:      Who did?  Who did?

 Ida:     His wife.  Mrs. Mendoza.  

 JD:      But then y’all: got, uh…y’all: got back after you got married and somebody had…who had made that lil house into a dancehall?

 Ida: Well, they made the dance.  We had a lil dancehall, that lil house, they made a dancehall with it and we had good time almost all night.  They all left, they all had to go by boats. They all left, and after they left, we set up the rest of the night, me and him, talkin.  I was too young, I knewed I was young.

 JD:      Did y’all: get any kind of presents in those days, when y’all: got married?  Did people bring presents?

 Ida:     I got one oatmeal dish.  One lil oatmeal dish, about this big around.  My aunt give me that.  My momma didn’t give me nothin.   And Agnes, they furnished everything, sheets, pillowcases, everything, when she got married.  But that was the difference between the two…and I was the one that would work!  She didn’t do nuttin, her. 

 JD:      Who played for your wedding? Who played for your…your dance?

 Ida:     My daddy and my uncle.   And then they had…we had…Jesse had a big, uh, olden time record player?   And when Uncle Si left, Daddy didn’t have nobody to play with him.  We played the record player.

 JD:      A crank record player?  On a spring?  You’d wind it up?

 Ida:     Umhm.  My daddy used to crank it, and play the records for us to dance.  My daddy stayed with me, but my momma went home.  When he left he come kissed us, he hugged Jesse, and he say “Well, y’all: make the best of it, now.  Yall on y’all: own”.  And I did

JD:      Well, like I say, I don’t want to wear you out on the first time, so…so, gonna have to come back if you don’t mind.

 Ida:     Yeah, you can come back. 

 JD:      I’m gonna go talk to Medric for a few minutes too, at his store?

 Ida:     Yeah, that’s another one you can get some…some old things.  And him and Jesse used to be buddies.   Jesse used to like Medric, and Medric used to like him.

 Ida:     When we was…Jim, you know, sometime things would get tough?  That we have to buy on credit?  Shee, I could’a got anything in that store from him.   Medric was a good man. 

 JD:      We’re gonna stop the tape recorder on this session now.

 Fini