Full Text of the Excerpt

MARY FREDERICKSON:

How did your family in North Carolina react to what was happening?

MARY PRICE ADAMSON:

We have a strong family loyalty and neither my brother nor neither of my sisters ever said to me, "What are you up to? What are you doing this for? Don't you know that you are hurting our situation?" And so forth and so on. No. And there was never a time when I was not welcomed to their homes even though I was getting quite a bit of very glaring publicity. My family was loyal. I never asked them about whether they intended to vote for me or not. My brother, Paul, who was a friend of Scott who was running on the regular Democratic ticket, Paul laughingly told me that he went to a bar-b-que out at Scott's farm and Scott said to him, "What are you doing here? You know that you're not going to be voting for me." He and Paul had a good laugh on the subject. Paul told me about that as a joke.

MARY FREDERICKSON:

Did they offer you any kind of support, by staying behind you and being loyal in a family sort of connection they offered you a kind of support, but did they offer you any kind of financial support?

MARY PRICE ADAMSON:

No, they never offered me and I never asked them. I respected them for what they wanted to do and they respected me for what I wanted to do. That's our family.

MARY FREDERICKSON:

Did it ever take the form of any kind of concern after that tour, when you were really in a very dangerous position? Were they worried about your physical well-being?

MARY PRICE ADAMSON:

If so, they never said anything about it. Mildred and Harold were a tower of strength to me and in a time when I had no job and no way to get paid, they always stood by me. For instance, in that very busiest summer in North Carolina, they insisted on my coming up to Maine where we had gone every summer for a great many years. They paid my plane fare for me to come to Maine and be able to have a rest in the midst of that very hectic summer of 1948. I went to Maine for a week at their expense.