Yes, we had two children at that time. That's all I got now. So Dad let
me have half the house, and I lived there while I worked for Revolution,
most of the time. So when they laid me off at Revolution the old man
that was my supervisor when I first went to work had got to be mill
superintendent at White Oak. So I went to see him (he was named Mr.
Armfield).
Page 10 I said: "Mr. Armfield, I need a job."
He said: "What've you been doing, Lacy?" I said: "Well, I've been
working down at Revolution." I said: "They laid me off down there when
they tore those speeders out." He said: "Yes, I know about that." He
told me, he said: "Well, I don't know of anything. I'll tell you what
you can do, though. You can go down there and see Mr. Gibson, the card
room supervisor; if he can put you to work, it's all right by me. I know
your work." So I went to see Gibson. He said no, he didn't have nothing;
they had more men than they knowd what to do with. So I went on back and
I waited 'til they were running four days a week. I went on back to the
house, and I laid around there 'til Thursday morning, the last day they
was going to run that week. And my dad started to work that morning
(when the work then was only eight hours a day, they worked at seven
o'clock). I said: "Dad, I believe I'll just walk down yonder and see Mr.
Armfield again." He said: "Well, it won't hurt none." I walked on down
there with him and I went up to the main office. I saw Mr. Armfield. He
told me, he said: "You go on see Mr. Beal. Wait here and see Mr. Beal
when he comes out to go to breakfast." [unknown] would go
in there and then come out and go to breakfast at seven o'clock. He
said: "You wait and see Mr. Beal." He said: "I understand he's got a job
in there he'll be needing somebody for, and you tell him that I told you
to tell him that if he needed a man on that job to put you on. I know
your work." So Mr. Beal come out; I told him what Mr. Armfield said. He
said: "Yes, I've got a job." He said: "What have you been doing?" And I
told him I'd been working Revolution. He said: "Well, let me give you a
slip. You have to have a slip to go back down there and go through the
employment office, see, when you got a job." They told me at Revolution,
they said: "Now if you can get
Page 11 a job at one of the
other plants within a week, why, we won't take your name off the
payroll." So I told Mr. Beal that, and he said: "Well," he said, "maybe
you better go back down to the payroll office and take this paper and
ask them about it, to be sure, because I want you to go to work Monday
evening." I said: "All right." So I went on down the street down there,
and I got about halfway down to the payroll office and I met a man
coming from Revolution. I worked for a man by the name … oh, I guess old
man Leonard was overseer in the carding room at Revolution, and I'd been
a working under him. So he sent a man after me. And I met the man about
halfway down there, and he said: "Mr. Leonard wants you to come back to
work." I said: "Well, Mr. Armfield just gave me a job a few minutes ago
with Mr. Beal." And I said: "I don't know what to do about it." "Well,
I'll tell you," he said. "Why don't you go talk to Mr. Leonard about
it." Well, Leonard lived just a few doors from where he was talking to
me. I went by there and talked to old man Leonard. He said: "Well, I
want you to come back and work for us." I'd run this new slubber some
for them, you see.