Phyllis Bestwick interview with Mr. and Mrs. D.H. Willingham, Mr. and Mrs. Will Morgan, Mr. and Mrs. Homer Bradley, and Mike Farrman

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If you believe you are the copyright holder of any of the content published in this collection and do not want it publicly available, please contact the Kenan Research Center at the Atlanta History Center at 404-814-4040 or reference@atlantahistorycenter.com. Phyllis Bestwick begins this recording by interviewing D.H. and Mrs. Willingham. While he tries to tell folk stories, she continually interrupts and speaks over him about various topics including her relationship with her father, the neighborhood cats, their family dog, and whether they believe in ghosts. Bestwick then interviews Will Morgan and his wife. Will Morgan plays songs on his one string banjo, a thin strip of wood curved like a bow with a single string attached at each end; his wife sings along with one of the songs. Next, Bestwick interviews Homer Bradley and his wife. Homer Bradley describes his experience attending a rural school as a child, then recalls hog hunting with his uncle. He tells Bestwick about the times his family took a wagon into the nearest town, Toccoa, Georgia, with goods to trade, such as chestnuts. Mrs. Bradley tells a story about a man who visited a witch doctor after failing to shoot a deer and recollects her grandmother using a matchstick to remove warts. Last, Bestwick interviews Mike Farrman, who describes kilns built into the side of a mountain that produced builders lime. He recalls an Indian trail located near the mountain that was flooded during the construction of Lake Hartwell, a flooding which submerged many relics. He lists a series of childrens games, including blindfold and chase, a game in which children chase each other while wearing blindfolds; Jacobs Ladder, a game in which children enact a performance behind a sheet with a lamp to create shadow puppets; and bird thrashing, when a group would stand on bushes, burn branches, and swat them at fleeing birds. Mr. and Mrs. Will Morgan conclude the recording by playing songs on his one string banjo. D.H. Willingham (1879-?) and his wife, Mrs. D.H. Willingham (1901-?), lived in Clarkesville, Georgia. Will Morgan (1883-1977) was born in Jackson County, Georgia, and lived in South and Central Georgia until about 1947 when he moved to Clarkesville, Georgia, where he lived with his wife until his death. Morgan was a farmer and a musician, and Mrs. Morgan enjoyed quilting. Homer Bradley (1889-?) was born and lived his whole life in Dillard, Georgia. Mike Farrman moved to Clarkesville, Georgia, in 1922. 'l'EXT OF HOMER BRADLEY AND WIFE - ---- --- Uh.~,There wa~n't any stores. I can remember when there was one ~tore in Clayton. And uh--sech a thing a~ going to the ~tore back in tho~e day~ wa~ just out of it. There was no stores to go to. If you didn't make i.t at home, you just didn't ha ve it --that wall all. So I went as a young boy--I went to school--walked two miles. Uh. Got a pair of shoes about Chrilltmas when my Daddy could make 'em. And, uh-'-we had to cut the wood for the little fellers and for ourselves, too---carried our lunch---in a bucket. Sometimes we'd eat it, sometimes we wouldn't. And uh, four months--four monthll school was what we had then. ,Just one teacher---all in one room. And we'd carry a bottle of milk, set it in the spring. Woaybe we'd go and get it and maybe we wouldn't. And the bigger boys had to look after the little uns--to keep wood and to keep 'em warm. So we '.1ullt had one book. Fin....lly >,;ot two--a reRder and a blueback speller. That's what we had. And we used them things till we wore 'em out. We didn't get a book every year. So that's about the way I was raised up in this section of the country 11 Well, back when I was a young man we had hogs in the woods. We, uh---Ilometimes t:hey'd be wild. Sometimes we'd have to kill 'ern in the woods. And me and my uncle went -------------------------------------------- one day, and we killed two big uns. So we couldn't get 'err. out. We had to clean 'ern in the wood~. So we dug a hole. 30t u~ ~ome bark and made U~ a trough to run the water lnto the hole, het rock, then het the water. We scalded them hogs that way---we boiled that water in that hole with those rocks. And---we finally got 'em dressed. And I think we made three--four trlps carrying them out of the mountains home. Had to get sacks, cut 'em up, carry 'em in and out in sacks. So back in those days that's the way we lived. We had our meat in the woods and that's the way we got it. Maybe fifteen or twenty boys, fifteen or twenty girls, fiddler, ,and a banjo. We'd dance all night. And especially Christmas time. We'd plan that night what H was going to be tomorrow night. And we'd just on through Christmas that"way. We'd go to someone f s We had a good t i1:1e. Them days t here was lot s of liquor in thls country, and you never did see nobody drunk. . . . . . . . . . . . . When I was a young man I could have sat here all night and t old you a ta Ie, one right after the ot her. You know, I believe, back when I was raised up though most people got along bet ter than th!! y do now. The y had plenty of tJrre---weren't rushed about anything. Wasn't no work, wasn't no money, but that didn't make no difference--wasn't anything to buy. You didn't need no money. 3 I knowed my daddy'd maybe sell a yearling. Get four or five dollars to pay a few taxes. And they didn't amount to anything either. And you just---there wasn't nothing to buy---you didn't need no money. I were almost a growned man before I over owned a quarter. There .Just wasn't nothing there to buy. In the fall of the year Yle'd load up a wagon aDd go to Toccoa. We'd called it going to market. We'd take off cabbage and apples and chestnuts. In those days theM woods was full of chestnuts. We didn't have to pick 'em up. we could rake 'em up. Just the nicest, prettiest chestnuts you ever looked s.t. We carried eight or te'n bushels of those things. And different things you know. He'd buy us what we had to have then for the ne7.t year. A sack of salt--we got it in hundred pound sacks, you know. And you could get a bag of coffee--twenty-five pound flour sack full, for a dollar. Of course, it was green. You had to parch it and grind it. We had a coffee mill. You don't know anything about grinding coffee, do you? No? Yes, you had to parch it. It wae green coffee. And my mama had what you call a coffee gourd---pour that coffee in that gourd, you know, and stock 'em up. You got ready to make coffee, you just poured out what you want and grind it. 1'1' s. Bradle y: We made a 11 our soap. Homer :Aradley: That's about the way we rot our "roceries, wta t we got. We'd go down to Toccoa. We be gone---me and 4 my uncle Wlle gone twenty daye one time. Snowed while we were p;one. And well, I think maybe he bought one man out while we was gone. And I had a bunch of chestnute. And I'd hit them nigger t owne, you know, and I had a pint cup--I' d get a dime a cup for 'em, you know. Oh, I had a pocketful of dimes. I thought I wae rich, and I wae in them daye, just abou t. You know what we had for ChrLl!ltmae? Cheetnute. We might get a etick of candy about that long. We mir;ht and we might not. It .1uet depended. But we had to hav,", them chestnute---we alwaye had cheetnuts. V~s. Bradley: And we always had a roasted hen. Iilea t L Lord! I never knowed my daddy to ha ve to be without meat in q while. We always had 11 smokehouse filled wlth meat. Killed four or five or eix hoge--whatever it took. Reba: Tell me what your mama said--about What your daddy told you---about the witches. Mrs. Bradley: Witches. I don't much want to tell you that. Would you Homer? Homer: Well, tell anything you want to. I eaid be just as blUbbery as you want to. (Laughs). Mrs. Bradley: Well. My father telled me what bie , father told him. About a man that went out and shot at 5 a deer, and he couldn't kill it. And the deer wouldn't run off, and he'd ~boot, and he couldn't kill it. So he went to a witch doctor, and tuk bis ~un. And the witch doctor done something to hill gun and told bim to go back and kill thet deer, and he'd hear a woman holler. And if she didn't get a rnesll of that deer, Ilhe would die, and for him not to give it to her. So we don't know whether he give it to her or not. And then my mother told me one about her grandmother and them trat told her.Now they--my parents--didn't see thill--they didn't. But they kind of halfway believed it--for it had been told tht'm. And they said tl::a t those two women---one of them wal picking beans and another un'came alon~. A.nd they got into 9. fus.. A.ud the one picking beans pulled a handful of leaves and threw them to her. And she turned sick and vomited them up. Now they didn't tell me whether ~he died or whet he r she didn't. But ~be vomi ted up them b~a.ns. You know, I don't like for my grandchildren to learn these things---would you? I've knowed of people that could stop blood, but they wouldn't teach you how. They could really ~top it. And I've seen them that could blowout fire. If you got burnt and went to them--well, they would whi~per something . , 6 and blow, and it wae gone. Now that workedl I've known it to work two or three times. They said they couldn't learn nobody else and do it themselvee. But they had a verse in the Bible that they sai.d. Then I get to thinking about theee witch talee and things like that that don't----. I just don't hsrdly want my grandchildren 'to know. What grandma says is the truth . I never did tell them no fairy tales nor stories . , They could read them for themselves like I did. And my mother didn't teachuli fa1.,ry tales, or anything like that. But she did teach ue the wItches. She didn't know this witch stuff, but she'd been told by her parente. And my father really beli.eved that hie daddy told him the truth about it that his father lcnowed that the man that shot the deer---that it was true. It could have been ------------------------------ - - TEXT OF MIKE FARRMAN eWell, uh--I'm Mike Farrman---live in Clar~sville, Georgia. We moved here in 1922. My fAther was pastor of the Baptist Church. Not too far from Clarksville, south toward Toccoa, there's a little small church ne.med Chopped Oak Church. Got its name from &l. chopped oak on an Indian trail. The church was establi8hed in eighteen and eighty-seven. The property was given by a r- William Lynn Walker, the owner of the Walker lime kiln, I which is on the same road from Rabua County, going south to Toccoa, Hartwell, and Elberton. It was the main road at that particular time. And theft they burned lime and was dIstributed thr ough northeast Georgia at that time. The kiln~s were built on the side of a mountain with an open mouth to burn the wood. The uh--the lime rock was found over--loose ly over the mountain typt'! and was skidded into the kiln by men. I understand the top salary waS twenty-five cents a day at that time. And then my grandfather was one of the--one of the laborers. (' They burned what they call cordwood to heat the rock, / and I!lfter heating the rock for some time the rock----. Approxima te ly e 19ht days, t he rock began to eli slntegrate \ and the lime was separated from the--uh--different trash l and--uh--made into builders' lime, which a lot of the At the lime kiln also there was a post office known asr":<lPe'iI') Georgia, and on thi!l--uh--on thia--- ~~-- at the post office in connection with the post office 1 was a large mill---grist mill, flour mill, and--uh-- meal. Uh--the mountain---uh--people in covered wagons bringing their produce down to sell it in the fall of the year would always come by this particular place, and place their order for their winter meal and flour to be picked up as they came back after they sold their chestnuts and apples and cabbage and things that they were taking down. Uh--Spear, Cleorgia is older than Toccoa, Cleorgia. It was an Indian trail. This road was originally marked by Indians. Dh--the Cherekee, coming south to the head waters of the Tugaloo River where they had. trading post, and uh--they traded with the Creek Indians. They brought stuff with them from Charleston--l1ke beads a nd glassware and things like that, and the Cherekee would swap their hides and skin in exchange for this. Uh-~this trading post was uh--on the Tugaloo Piver, whIch is the boundary between South Carolina and Georgia. Near the ---it's where the now stands. Uh--which is now, also---Lake Hartwell 3 covers this spot. Several years before they backed up the Lake Hartwell Lake over this particular trading PO!!t, the students from the University of Georgia and all the (',alleges came in---and---mo!!tly the archives students that were getting their masters' degrees. They used prisons--prison labor to dig and sift this entl.re bottom for re lies from the Indians, ano t hey were ve ry successful. Very successful. Found a lot of stuff they carried back to the University of Georgia, and some of it went to the Smithsonian Institute. * * * * * ~ * i~ * * Well, uh, this morning after leaving the Chopped Oak area we went to--up to New Liberty road to the Kolock home. We talked to }Cr. Henry Jerrell, the caretaker. Had been there for approximately seventy-flve years--!!ince he was a young boy---as caretaker for the place. 'I'he house was built "before the war between the state!!, and, uh, ls stlll In very good repalr. Great grandchildren !!till use the pl~ce a!! a summer home. The place 15 in very good condl.tion. Built by slave labor. * * * * * * * * * * ~f A few game!! that children played fifty ye&rs ago up in the mountains, uh---one was--uh--blind fold. \'Ie'd blindfold and chase pe ople around up in the room, 4 which was a lot of fun for litt Ie kids. Another "arne vra~ the--uh--Jacob's Ladder, we called It. We'd hang a ~heet over an--q open door, and in the back of the room we'd put the lamp or the lantern down, and between the lamp and the sheet one of the--one of the kid~ would perform. 'l'he audience would be in the other room. And they would uh--make--uh--funny motjon~ and make lI'abbits with their hands and different things like that, whJc!l created quite a thrill for the kid~. Another outdoor sport for the boy~ just a little older wa~ bird thrashing, which ha~ cea~ed to be heard of in these section~---but the boys would go out in the winter time and come t'o a bru~h pile which there were lots of them at that time. Uh--and they'd take a--a-bunch of ~Vlitches and tie them together and make sort of a broom-like thing, and, uh--one of the boy~ would jump on the brush pile and bounce up and down, and as the birds fly out in the dark--uh--they would u~ually fly toward ~ torch---a big torch that would blind them, and. The torch wa~ a big, thick piece of flat pine, and about half of it would be burning, and one of 'em Vlould be carrying this. Usuall:r the bird thrashi.ng uh--was for the purpose o~ gettin' quail. . The l'Iir.aller bIrd~ they also thrashed 'em, but, uh--they were not esten. 5 Usually rabbits run out also, and the boys had quite a fun chasing the rabbit around in the--in the dark. We also drove up to Macedonia Church, which was established in 1854. Uh--one of the oldest sections in Habersham County. stephens County was cut off of Habersham, and so was White County. Habersham was--uh-- cut off of a corner in Banks County. But most of the courthouses and the older buildings in this section were made from the lirr,e that came from the Walk.er lime"kiln. t Thqt particular stream, all the way down to the Tugaloo I RJver, had quite a--a--deposJt of lime rock. ~own below ll \ the 'Nqlker lime kiln several miles, there was another kiln known as the Davison lime kiln. A PDF transcript exists for this recording. Please contact an archivist for access. Professor John Burrison founded the Atlanta Folklore Archive Project in 1967 at Georgia State University. He trained undergraduates and graduate students enrolled in his folklore curriculum to conduct oral history interviews. Students interviewed men, women, and children of various demographics in Georgia and across the southeast on crafts, storytelling, music, religion, rural life, and traditions. 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