Abstract of an interview with Sallie Kate Moore Williams

Benjamin Van Clark Neighborhood Documentation Project
Neighborhood Oral History Project
Savannah Department of Cultural Affairs
Oral History# 16
Sallie Kate (Moore) Williams
June 26, 2003
Savannah, Georgia
Mrs. Williams is a retired public school teacher in Savannah/Chatham County Public School System.
The following is an abstract of the interview, for a complete recording of the interview please see the
corresponding cassette tape:
I was born, in 1935, in the Charity Hospital in Savannah, Georgia. Drucilla, my younger sister,
was born at our home on 929Wheaton Street in 1939. Daddy (Philander Moore) was born, in 1879, in
Darien, Georgia. Mother's people were the Bleach's of Augusta, Georgia. When daddy left Mcintosh
County, he came to Savannah to study the blacksmithing and barbering trades. He studied at Georgia
State Industrial College, in the teens of the twentieth century, under Richard R Wright, Sr., first
president of what is now Savannah State University. Dad was born May 1879, when he died in March
1978, he was a month and two days from being one hundred years old. Dad said Wheaton Street was
noted as a prominent area for blacks to live in when he came to Savannah. When he initially came to
Savannah, he and Mary Stoney Williams, my mother, lived in housing on the campus of GSIC. My
mother was daddy's second wife. Lillian Simmons Moore, his first wife, died, and she was Wade
Medicus Simmons, Sr.'s sister. The Simmons were also our neighbors on Wheaton Street on the north
side of the street Other black families on Wheaton Street were the Frank Curleys (later the Frank
Callen home- he married Irma Curley Callen), Dr. and Mrs. George Smith (Pearl E. Smith, his wife,
was the first black female pharmacist in Savannah, Georgia). The James Walker family lived on
Wheaton Street between 3"' and 4111 Streets.
On the left side of our house at 929 Wheaton Street, dad had a confectionary store. His
mother would come to Savannah from Darien, Georgia, to cook for the store. On the right side of our
house was a furniture repair store. In our backyard, daddy had a blacksmith shop and forge. He made
oyster grabs, a tool to harvest oysters, for the Maggioni and Caesaroni's seafood business in
Thunderbolt, Georgia (these were white families). My father had his blacksmith shop, where he also
shoed horses for Starland Dairy, until about1940. Daddy was a very quiet man who never said much.
He retired from Georgia State Industrial College (now Savannah State University) on three different
occasions, but the last time was1953. Initially, he was retired before I was born, in 1935, but he came
back to Georgia State where he was in charge of the heating plant.
I remember as a child on Wheaton Street that a dry cleaner, grocery store, about four or five
tenant houses that whites lived in were there. There was a radio shop that became a Chinese family
owned grocery store. Ricks Glass Company bought the Chinese grocery store, and started their
business at the comer of Harmon and Wheaton Streets. Ricks Glass Company came to the area in
about the late fifties or early sixties. The glass company was not there, in 1953, when I finished Alfred
E. Beach High School. On our side of Wheaton Street (south side of the street) in the 900 block lived
the black Thomas family (Henton Thomas was one of their sons). Furlher down Wheaton Street, a
white family owned a bakery, and they lived upstairs. My sister Drucilla and I would play with Mary, their
daughter.
Page 2 of2 August27,2003
Documents of Philander Moore in possession of Mrs. Sallie K. Williams:
Original handwritten February 15, 1928, contract between Philander Moore and S. Bennet for
Bennet to build Mr. Moore's two-story house at 929 Wheaton Street for the sum of $3,700.
Original blueprints for the house at 929 Wheaton Street.
A July 17, 1923, letter to Philander Moore from Cyrus G. Wiley, second president of Georgia
State Industrial College (1921 -1926) (now Savannah State University).
Two letters to Philander Moore from Benjamin F. Hubert, third president of Georgia State
Industrial College (1926- 1947). A July 1, 1927, letter from President Hubert appointed
Philander Moore to the GSIC Board of Trustees from July 1, 1927 to July 1, 1928. The other
letter from President Hubert to Philander Moore was dated July 18, 1930.
A 1907 edition of Buffalo Forges, Blacksmith Tools, Power Blowers & Exhausters, Heating and
Ventilation Pumps published by Buffalo Forge Company, Buffalo, New York, U.S.A- No. 177.
Philander Moore used this as a textbook for his blacksmithing classes at Georgia State
Industrial College.
-End of interviewAbstract prepared by:
Charles J. Elmore
Project Historian