[TAPE 1, SIDE A]

[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]

PATTY DILLEY:

. . .where you were born?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I was born in Rowan County, Salisbury. We lived there until I was three years old, and then we moved up to Iredell County near Mooresville. Then from there we moved up here in Catawba County. Been living here ever since. Lived over in Vale section till 1961 we came over here, wasn't it?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

We have three homes. Just out there are the homes we built.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Decided to sell out and move closer to town. I drove back and forth to work for years. It was in the . . .

PATTY DILLEY:

Country?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, we did. I'm a country boy. [Laughter]

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

It was two or three miles you walked through the snow every winter to meet your relatives.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Couldn't get gas, you know, way back in there much, and we'd pool rides. You would go through the snow about three miles to get to the ride. [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

Were your parents farmers?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, they was farmers. And he made furniture; there's where I got into it. He had a little furniture shop out in the country. He made all kinds of furniture, chairs and what they called kitchen safes back then. Those cupboards; there was tin up the doors with those little holes punched in.

PATTY DILLEY:

Pie safes.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Called kitchen cupboards. He made lots of them, and then he made a few coffins. They didn't call them caskets back then; coffins, you know, back in them days.

PATTY DILLEY:

Where did he learn how to do that?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

That's the reason I learned how to make furniture; my father trained me up. We'd go in the woods and cut our timber and haul it in and dry it and make it into furniture. That was when I was at High Point.

PATTY DILLEY:

How did he learn how to do that?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

From his father. His father made old wooden clocks. They was interesting.

PATTY DILLEY:

This was a family skill handed down?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, that's right.

PATTY DILLEY:

I hadn't talked to anybody before that was like that.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

My grandfather was a clockmaker.

PATTY DILLEY:

Was he from Germany, perhaps?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, his folks were German, but he was born and raised here in the United States. His father was from Germany, and his grandmothers were Dutch.

PATTY DILLEY:

Why did you decide to leave home and go to High Point?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

We was kind of poor folks, and we couldn't kind of make ends meet. My grandfather lived at High Point, and so I stayed with them and worked over there. And I worked there for several years, and I came back to Hickory and worked at Hickory and boarded over there at Hickory. My folks lived out there in the Vale section, and I'd go home about every month [unclear].

PATTY DILLEY:

When you first went to High Point, what plant did you work in there?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

The Alma Furniture Company. Then I left there and went to the Columbia Furniture Company.

PATTY DILLEY:

What was your first job?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

My first job was running a tenon machine.

PATTY DILLEY:

Can you describe that to me?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Like this here, if this post is mortised out, you know, holes cut in there, and then you cut a tenon to fit it in there and put glue on it

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and then drive a nail in the back side to hold it till you pull it apart.

PATTY DILLEY:

So a tenon machine would drill a hole in it?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

The post had a mortise in it. Then you'd cut a tenon on it to put in that mortise there, and that'd hold it together, you see. I've got a little shop down yonder I make furniture. I ought to bring that table in here and show it to you, but. . .

PATTY DILLEY:

We can go out and look at it then after.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I don't have much down there.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

He don't have many tools to work with.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Then I went to Hickory Chair Company. I run a shaper over there, shape up that post. Throw them out like this. Then from that I run a cutoff saw. Then when I went to Conover, I done a little of everything all over the shop. I was kind of the main man around there. And we made school desks, and we made kitchen safes there. They made them by the hundreds there. And hickory sticks for cotton mills, and all kinds of cotton mill supplies. And chicken coops.

PATTY DILLEY:

Yes, I had heard all that.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I done a little of everything. Then the plant growed; it got a lot of big machinery in there, and they put me as assistant foreman there for quite a while. Then finally they sold out and went to Hickory. Worked there at Conover for years.

PATTY DILLEY:

Yes, they had sold out to Broyhill.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, that's right.

PATTY DILLEY:

When you were working at High Point, how did you learn to do that first job?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Well, it wasn't hard for me to do it. The foremanwent in and showed me how, and I went ahead and done it. I couldn't set it up too good

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for a while, and there was a mechanic that come in and set it up for me. But it wasn't long till I got onto it.

PATTY DILLEY:

So you didn't have any kind of training period.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No, I just learnt the hard way.

PATTY DILLEY:

Just while you were working.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

He worked with a lot of machinery, but didn't get hurt on it.

PATTY DILLEY:

That's amazing.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, that's right. I've got all of my fingers. How much do you think I made a day there, ten hours?

PATTY DILLEY:

I don't know.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

A dollar and a thin dime a day. [Laughter] That's what they always said.

PATTY DILLEY:

What year was this when you first went to High Point?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

1913.

PATTY DILLEY:

How old were you then?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Sixteen.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did you go with anybody over there to High Point?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No, I just stayed with my grandfather and grandmother.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Walked to work.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did they work at the furniture plants there?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No. He was kind of a wealthy fellow. He had lots of houses he rented out. Of course, he didn't get too much out of it, but he didn't work for them.

PATTY DILLEY:

This isn't the grandfather that was the clockmaker.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, he made the clocks.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

He made the baskets, too, didn't he?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, I worked in a basket factory over there, tobacco warehouse baskets, and I nailed them together.

PATTY DILLEY:

Was this while you were in High Point?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. A lot of times on Saturday I wouldn't be working at the furniture plant, and I went with him to make these basket things.

PATTY DILLEY:

Would your father sell the furniture he made just to local people?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Oh, yes, he would have to write his orders down, he had so many come in.

PATTY DILLEY:

Were most of the people from around that area?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

All around in the country, neighbors, good friends. They'd come from a distance when they found out he made furniture. He sold quite a lot of it.

PATTY DILLEY:

So you didn't have any trouble finding a job when you got to High Point?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No. My grandfather went with me, and I remember he said, "Could you give my son-in-law [grandson] a job? He's a young boy, and he's trying to start out and would like to have a job." "Yes, we'll try him. Bring him in." So the next day I went in and went to work. A dollar and a dime a day.

PATTY DILLEY:

Gosh. How long did you stay there in High Point?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

About two years and a half.

PATTY DILLEY:

And then you came to Hickory?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I come to Hickory.

PATTY DILLEY:

Why did you decide to come to Hickory?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I got tired of High Point. I wanted to come home and be at home with my folks.

PATTY DILLEY:

Was there a difference in the towns?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, a lot. That's a large town, High Point is, but Hickory back in . . .

PATTY DILLEY:

Hickory wasn't very big then.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No, not at first. And I knew quite a few people in Hickory, and I decided to come on home. unknown Then I got more money here at Hickory than I did at High Point.

PATTY DILLEY:

So you first went to Hickory Manufacturing?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Hickory Chair.

PATTY DILLEY:

Why did you go to that particular plant?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I just don't know. I was out job hunting and happened to start there first, and they give me the job.

PATTY DILLEY:

Do you remember a man there, Ralph Bowman?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Oh, yes, sure. He was the superintendent there a while, wasn't he?

PATTY DILLEY:

Yes.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

That was after I quit there. Bratt [unclear]Hall was the superintendent when I was there. I don't know whether you knew him or not. He's passed away.

PATTY DILLEY:

I don't know Bratt Hall, but I've talked to Mr. Bowman.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Bowman was the assistant, I think, when I was there.

PATTY DILLEY:

Were they good bosses?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Oh, law, yes. They were real good. But you didn't get no breaks like you do now. I worked ten hours a day and had to work right on through. They didn't want you to even have a sandwich or anything with you.

PATTY DILLEY:

You had to really work hard.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, you bet you did.

PATTY DILLEY:

You had to work all ten hours you were there.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. Get an hour for lunch, but go right back. You had to

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punch out.

PATTY DILLEY:

You had to punch out for lunch.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, when you'd go back in. Ten hours. It seemed I got two dollars and a half there a day. [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

What were you doing then?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I run the shaper, band saw, boring machine to bore holes. Like for a pin to. . . .

PATTY DILLEY:

Like for a dowel.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, like for dowel pins. They'd drive dowel pins, and that'd hold a dowel together. If you didn't have this mortised, you see, you'd drill holes in there. Drill holes in this rail, and put about two dowels in there, and the dowels would go into the post there. And that's the way we'd put it together with the chairs.

PATTY DILLEY:

Rather than nailing them together.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

After I quit there, I went to the table factory before I went to Conover. It was called Highland Furniture then. I run a big planer down there. Then I kind of got mad at the foreman there, this Henry Clay, so I went down to Conover and worked there.

PATTY DILLEY:

Why did you go from Hickory Chair over to the table place?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

They offered me more money. I knew the superintendent. I was getting two and a half up there at Hickory Chair, and they started me in at three dollars a day at the table factory.

PATTY DILLEY:

How many years had you been working for Hickory Chair?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Three. I worked at the table factory about a year and a half.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

You worked a little at the Century [unclear].

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, I went over had helped them start up, but I didn't like the place. They had a big automatic shaper, a double head, and I run it for six weeks. They offered me a good price if I'd take it up, and Southern Desk down there

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wanted me to come back over there, and unknown they give me a better price than they was giving me, unknown so I said I'd come.

PATTY DILLEY:

What was it about that one machine that you didn't like, the big shapers?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

That automatic? unknown Oh, it had such big forms you had to. . . . Oh, they was a lot bigger than this table and about four inches thick. You'd have to pick them up and lay them down in and bolt them fast. They was big tables. It was a lot bigger table than that table over there. And just run it around and around. And then it was double-headed, and it was aggravating to run, and I just didn't like it. And then I didn't like the boss too good. [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

What would be the difference between a boss like that and somebody that you did like to work for?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Well, when you go in, and it seems like you can't please him, and you just think, "I'm not going to stay here; I'm going where they'll treat me better."

PATTY DILLEY:

They appreciate you.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. Where they appreciate you. Well, they would let me stay on there. told them I was going back to Southern Desk, which they gave me more money to come back. [Interruption]

PATTY DILLEY:

So you went from the table place, where you were running that big shaper?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No, that was the big planer at the table factory. I run that about a year and a half. And then I heard about Conover, and so I went down there and stayed a couple of years.

PATTY DILLEY:

How did you hear?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Different ones were telling me about it. I knew some sanders unknown working down there. Left before I did from the table factory

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and went down there. Said it was such a good place to work, which it was.

PATTY DILLEY:

What would they say about it?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

They'd say, "Meyers, why don't you go down to Conover? They have mighty good foremen down there, and I think you'd enjoy working for them. They pay pretty good. Why don't you try it?"

PATTY DILLEY:

So there were people living in Hickory working in Conover?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, quite a few of us. And she had a brother who worked down there, and we was living out in the Vale section at that time. That was too far to drive back and forth unknown every day, and so I rode in by bus. That's one of the reasons we moved down here nearer.

PATTY DILLEY:

What was your brother's name?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Logan Workman.

PATTY DILLEY:

So you were a Workman.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Yes. Did you know Scott Workman?

PATTY DILLEY:

I've interviewed him, too.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

He worked up in High Point [unclear].

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

He was my baby brother. There was ten children of us.

PATTY DILLEY:

I've talked to most of your brothers then, because I've talked to Lee Workman and Scott Workman and Memory Workman.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Memory died here a few months ago.

PATTY DILLEY:

Yes. This was two years ago.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I got all them brothers jobs. I started first and got all them brothers jobs. Let's see, Lee and Memory and Scott and Zeb and Jake. In fact, there were five who got jobs there.

PATTY DILLEY:

Gosh, that little place. If you'd gotten rid of the Workmans, they would have had to close the place down.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

unknown They would come and stay with us. Had to cook for them, you know.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

We moved over to Conover eventually.

PATTY DILLEY:

How did you all meet? Were you from Vale?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

They moved up there about two miles from where I lived. We'd see one another back and forth, and so we got acquainted, and it was from then on. [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

When you all first got married, did you have your own house or did you move in with parents?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

He'd bought an old log house.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

It was on a little old farm, a twelve-acre farm. [Laughter]

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

And it had a little log house on it, and it was plastered all inside. And we'd take newspapers and decorate it all inside with it, and then we'd put the pictures out of magazines around to make it pretty. And so when it would rain, we'd have to get up of a night and move our bed around and around out of the rain. [Laughter] It even had a little woodman's stove.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

A cook stove.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Then he went to the store and got some little pots and pans, and we started that way. We didn't have nothing. I did have a bed and some bedding.

PATTY DILLEY:

That you got from home.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

No, I made myself. . . . I had about eight or ten quilts made when I was twelve years old. I love to do that.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I made the dining table and unknown little kitchen cupboards and different little things. We didn't have too much room in that little shack. [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

This was an old tobacco barn?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No, it was an old. . . . It weren't used for anything. I

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want to show you our bedroom furniture I made. I made that at Conover.

PATTY DILLEY:

Okay, we'll see it.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

In fact, we lived with her folks for awhile.

PATTY DILLEY:

You did?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, we was all real close.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

And then we did have to move around the house.

PATTY DILLEY:

So you all lived out there until you moved into Conover?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. Moved to Conover. I don't know just how many years ago, though.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

About forty years at the least.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

And we lived up above the hardware store.

PATTY DILLEY:

You were boarding in town during the school years?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes.

PATTY DILLEY:

So you didn't have to catch a ride.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

That's right. unknown I was paying four and a half a week. That was real cheap then. [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

Well, the money went a lot further then, I guess.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yeah, four and a half a week. unknown That was really cheap.

PATTY DILLEY:

When you were working for Conover, how many hours a day would you work?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Ten. I got to be assistant foreman there. I had to put in a lot more hours, though. unknown I don't know if Scott told you that or not.

PATTY DILLEY:

He had mentioned that you were some kind of foreman.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

And I run a lot of the machines there; I run a tenon machine and a ripsaw and unknown cutoff saws and a boring machine, band saw, dowel machine, rip saw, triple unknown saw. Anything that was in there, I could run.

PATTY DILLEY:

As assistant foreman, what would you do then, extra?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Had to do a lot of machine setting up. Set up the machines and see that the stuff went through right. The right amount and all that.

PATTY DILLEY:

But during all of this time, you unknown actually worked, too, running the machines.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

That's right. Go in and set it up and see that the men had a job they were working on. That's nerve-racking.

PATTY DILLEY:

[Laughter] I bet. What was the hardest thing the foreman would do?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

If you didn't get your stuff out right or get it on time. The superintendent would come around: "Why is this behind here? Meyers, you'd better get busy and get it on out." That was about the hardest thing.

PATTY DILLEY:

To get the people to get going.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

"Get this man on it over here.. He's standing there. I would get him to work." [Laughter] I'd be out there working, getting something set up or something, cutting it out, and then a couple men standing there waiting. "Why don't you have them to do that? Them standing there, and you doing the work." Didn't like to see that.

PATTY DILLEY:

Who was the superintendent at that time?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Bill Roberts. He's passed away a couple years ago, I think. If you didn't happen to know, Ralph Simmons was the one in Conover.

PATTY DILLEY:

Yes, as a matter of fact, I have interviewed Ralph Simmons.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Ralph Simmons was my foreman when I first went down there. We made school desks.

PATTY DILLEY:

Yes, and Frank Gilbert.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

He's dead. Ralph is living, isn't he?

PATTY DILLEY:

He was last year when I talked to him.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

He's in bad shape, heart.

PATTY DILLEY:

I knew that Mr. Simmons knew a lot about machines. Did he teach you some of your jobs?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Oh, he sure did. He was a real good saw filer. He kept all the saws sharpened up. He'd sharpen saws and band saws, and he was real good at it. He learnt me a lot. But they quit the school desks and put me up as a foreman. And then the new superintendents come in there, and we finally went to Newton Furniture Company. I left Conover and went to Newton. And the new management over there put me in as as assistant foreman.

PATTY DILLEY:

What was the management change? Did Mr. Brady die or what?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No, it got so it wasn't making very much money. It kind of went in the hole, and they had gotten way in debt, and they sold out to Broyhill. unknown They kind of went bankrupt and sold out.

PATTY DILLEY:

So Mr. Brady was still living during that time?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Oh, yes.

PATTY DILLEY:

But he wasn't in charge of it.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No. His son-in-law had taken over, and he really wasn't too good at it.

PATTY DILLEY:

That's what I heard. His name is Bill Barker?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, but that's what ruined the place. If he hadn't come there, probably the place would be running yet. Mr. Brady ran a sharp outfit.

PATTY DILLEY:

What kinds of things did Mr. Barker do? Did he just not know that much about the furniture industry, or what?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

He had a good college education, but he didn't know beans about furniture. He tried to change everything from what Mr. Brady did.

PATTY DILLEY:

I believe Mr. Brady had a partner, one of the Shufords in town?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, Maynard Shuford. Maynard run the glove will down there, Warlong Glove, unknown very small plant. Maynard run the glove mill, and Mr. Brady run the furniture factory. And they were partners unknown in that. Maynard Shuford was a banker, too. He was president of the Conover Bank at that time.

PATTY DILLEY:

What was the name of that glove mill? Was it Warlong?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, Warlong.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did a lot of the wives of the people that worked here at the plant work at the glove mill?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, they did. Lots of them. She never did get to go up there. [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

Did you ever do any public work?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

I worked in the cotton mill.

PATTY DILLEY:

When was this?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

That was in 1919, right after World War I.

PATTY DILLEY:

Were you married then?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

No.

PATTY DILLEY:

Where did you work?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

At the Clyde Mill in Newton. Knitting all these socks. They've got something else over there now; it's not unknown like it was when I worked there.

PATTY DILLEY:

Were you still living up in Vale?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Yes. Mr. Will Stanley was the boss there at this mill. Back then hands was scarce. A lot of them was in service. So he found out that Dad had a big family, and he came over and got us to move over there.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did your whole family move?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Yes. We was there three years. Then Dad got tired of it,

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and we moved back, and then Mr. Stanley needed me back. And he come to the field where we was working, and he asked Dad if he would have me to come back to work.

PATTY DILLEY:

What kind of job did you do?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

I run a spooler. You wouldn't know what it was.

PATTY DILLEY:

I sort of know. I've been in a mill a couple of times.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

You had a cone thing, you know. You'd hold a spool down, and there's your thread and you held your hand like that and tied the threads. From a bobbin to the spool.

PATTY DILLEY:

And it rewound it?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

On a spool about that tall. And I enjoyed it, because I like working. It was very good pay; it was very hard.

PATTY DILLEY:

When your whole family went there, did your father go to work, too?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Oh, yes.

PATTY DILLEY:

And your mother?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

No, she had to cook for all of us. And do all the washing for us. She had it hard.

PATTY DILLEY:

How many kids did you have in your family?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

There were three girls and seven boys.

PATTY DILLEY:

You could almost run one shift with that crew.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Yes. [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

But your father didn't like the work too much.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Mr. Stanley gave him an easy job. He was getting pretty old. It was 1919.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

He used to run a blacksmith's shop.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Oh, yes, my dad did. He made wheat cradles. It had six fingers to it in the side, built all together, and them six fingers would come around and catch the wheat straw and throw it all in bundles, and then

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we'd go behind and wrap them and bind them up, and then we'd shock them into shocks of wheat.

PATTY DILLEY:

Would your father make these himself?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Oh, yes. And then he'd run a blacksmith's shop, too, and make wagons and all different things like that. And he would always call on me to run the bellows, a little fire to heat things. Had a big bellows. It was fun.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did you like helping him?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Oh, yes.

PATTY DILLEY:

It was better than working out in the fields.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Yes. Oh, that was real hard. unknown [Laughter] And then Mother and them would call, and I would work till eleven o'clock and go in and help her finish lunch. And then after we all ate, they'd go sit down there. I had to wash the dishes, and when I got through they was ready to go back to the mill. I never got a bit of rest.

PATTY DILLEY:

[Laughter] Were you the oldest girl?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Yes.

PATTY DILLEY:

That's the way it is unknown with the oldest girl. Always had it the worst.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Yes, that's right. They have more to do than the rest of them. Then I worked some in Lincolnton. Had to to help feed the rest of the family. Dad didn't make much in the blacksmith's shop.

PATTY DILLEY:

Would you board in Lincolnton, or ride?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Yes, with my aunt. There wasn't but just a few cars then.

PATTY DILLEY:

I'm trying to keep track of everything. I want to get both of you all's stories. How old were you when you first went to work?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

About fifteen years old I quit schooling. I had to to help the family. I just quit school and went to work and give him my wages to help raise up the children. unknown See, I was the third child.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

The oldest girl.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did your older brothers go out and find any jobs, too?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

The second brother did.

PATTY DILLEY:

Where did he work?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

With me. unknown [Laughter] In the cotton mill in Gastonia.

PATTY DILLEY:

Gastonia? And you all went to Gastonia?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

We boarded down there.

PATTY DILLEY:

How old were you all when you all got married?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

I was twenty-two, and he was twenty-three.

PATTY DILLEY:

Was that old back then to get married?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

No.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Back then they didn't get married quite as young as they do now. Isn't that right, Nellie?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Well, I just didn't see nobody that I thought I'd love enough. [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

Have you worked since you've been married?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

No. I've done the housework. Tend the farm.

PATTY DILLEY:

So you didn't ever work after you were married.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

unknown No, not since we've been married. I did between times. I was working at the cotton mill when we first got married.

PATTY DILLEY:

Let me get back to your work over there in Conover. What year did you leave to go up to Hickory?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

unknown

PATTY DILLEY:

Was that when the plant set up?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. unknown They (Conover) was running part-time after I left, after they'd started on that receivership. Southern Desk, they had to close down for a while, so I came back to Conover for two or three years, and then I went back up there to Southern.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did you have any people that you knew at Southern Desk?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No, I didn't, but I had some friends who worked there.

PATTY DILLEY:

A lot of your friends were going?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Not a lot, but some.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did you just go up to the plant and ask for a job?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. I went there on Friday afternoon, and the foreman said, "Come in on Monday morning." "I'm from over in Conover," I told him. And I told him what-all I could do, and He says, "I've got a tenon machine sitting over here waiting on someone. It'll be a few days before it can be fixed, but I'll give you a job around here before I get it started." unknown And then I went right on. They looked like good people. [unclear]

PATTY DILLEY:

Did you work with a tenon machine the whole time you were there at Southern Desk?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No, I looked after it. I run it for about two or three years. Then he put me as a setup man with an automatic shaper, getting things around there set up for the men. They had a panel sizer, and that was about the biggest job I had, keeping it set up, and keep the stuff moving in and out and stacked. unknown That's a hollow-core door, and we'd make the panels and size them to the right shape. Say, about six, eight by forty-eight inches wide, and the sizer just run it through

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Page 19

and unknown rip-saw cut it on both edges, and just carry it on through. You'd start it in there, and then it'd take it on through automatically by itself.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did any of the men that ran the machines set up their own machines?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, they could set up. Nothing very particular about it. I'd have to okay most of it. Just the ordinary stuff I would, but anything particular, I had to do it. [unclear] Yes, they'd set it up. I did have to okay the thickest part of it. unknown I had to grind knives and different things. See that the saws were sharpened.

PATTY DILLEY:

I guess the setup man would be a pretty skilled job.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, it was.

PATTY DILLEY:

What is involved in setting up a machine?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

You've got to know just what to do to it. A paper would spell it out, tell exactly what to do to each piece, and how to cut it on a forty-five angle. Cut tenons on it or whatnot. Or maybe a tenon unknown on one end. And when I really wrote unknown their tickets good, they'd get it right.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Then you was making most of the church pews.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

unknown College furniture. We made lots of tables and chairs for colleges, laboratory stuff.

PATTY DILLEY:

Stuff for classrooms and dormitory stuff, I guess.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Church furniture, pews and pulpits and . . .

PATTY DILLEY:

So they made institutional furniture rather than stuff for home use.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

That's right. unknown They didn't make any home furniture at all.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did that plant ever change hands at Southern Desk?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, Drexel taken it over.

PATTY DILLEY:

What year was that?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

1959, I believe.

PATTY DILLEY:

Was there a difference when a big corporation like Drexel took over?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Drexel owns several plants. There's one big Drexel in Lenoir, and then in Drexel.

PATTY DILLEY:

What kind of changes would they bring in?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Very few. They were generally making the same furniture.

PATTY DILLEY:

Would they bring in their own supervisors?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No, they left the ones there. It was the same supervisors, the same president.

PATTY DILLEY:

The same president in?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, that's right.

PATTY DILLEY:

So I guess just the ownership changed.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

That's right.

PATTY DILLEY:

Who owned Southern Desk?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

The Iveys. Mr. George Ivey and Leon and Elbert, his two sons. There was three sons. Mr. George Ivey was the founder of it. He had a big sawmill there. That's where it started out in. People would bring hickory logs in, and they'd saw them. They'd start sawing in the fall of the year about September and saw till way up in the summer, say in June.

They'd haul it in carloads and truckloads and things. They made picker sticks for the cotton mill. Dowel pins. You know what a dowel pin is; I was showing you a while ago. They run a dowel pin factory up there yet.

PATTY DILLEY:

So he started out doing that.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

That's right.

PATTY DILLEY:

And then built the Southern Desk.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, built the church furniture. All kinds of college and school supplies, school desks. Like I say, he didn't make any household

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Page 21

kitchen furniture at all.

PATTY DILLEY:

Do you remember during the times of the Depression and what happened?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I sure do. I was at Conover then.

PATTY DILLEY:

How long would you go without work at times?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I was really fortunate. They was making samples, and the bossman and I and one or two more men got to work. We worked the whole time, making samples, trying to get something started. Maybe the men would work two or three days a week, then maybe'd be off a couple weeks, or even months, at a time. unknown But I was fortunate. I had a job almost steady. Since I was kind of an all-around man, I'd go in the dry kiln and get the lumber out and bring it in and cut it up and stack it, just bring it on through and get it ready for the cabinet maker.

PATTY DILLEY:

What did the other people do, who weren't as lucky as that and could only come in and work for a couple of days?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

They'd run the whole plant when they'd come in there like that.

PATTY DILLEY:

When they'd get an order?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. They'd have a few orders and work it out. Maybe one man would bring in the lumber, and another would cut it up in the cutoff saw, and then a couple would rip it up and band-saw it and run unknown it out and then finally to the tenon machine, the triple saws, the boring machine, dowels. And sand it, and then it was ready to go upstairs to the cabinet room. Speaking of Scott, he run the sander there for me a long time. That's a machine sander, you know about that, you just send the materials through.

PATTY DILLEY:

Right. Was it a drum sander?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No, that's a unknown machine sander; it has three drums on it. A drum sander, just one. You've got to hold the pieces on it to sand. You just put it in, and the rollers pulls it in. Like a planer.

PATTY DILLEY:

You don't even have to use any muscle.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. A drum sander, you've got to hold it on the drum.

PATTY DILLEY:

A machine sander and drum sander.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I believe you know a lot about . . .

PATTY DILLEY:

I know a little bit. But I'm out here talking to a lot of people. I learn it round-about. I feel like I ought to know enough to go in there and just turn the switch on.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

[Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

Do a little bit.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Have you ever visited one of the plants?

PATTY DILLEY:

I've been through the Bassett plant over in Newton. I know Hoyt Lewis over there; he's the superintendent. He took me through two years ago. They've made a lot of changes there since.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Pretty interesting to anybody that cares anything about looking at it.

PATTY DILLEY:

Yes, it is.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

We'd have lots of people visiting, like the schoolteachers would bring the children in from the schools, take them all around and show them everything, how they worked.

PATTY DILLEY:

Was this at Southern Desk?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. Mr. Ivey would come in unknown show unknown and explain to them.

PATTY DILLEY:

What was Mr. Ivey like as a person to work for?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Oh, he was real good. If he'd see you make a mistake, he'd say, "Hee! Yah! I want you to do that right now." And he'd show you how. He'd really call you down. If you were maybe running one piece, "Can't you run two pieces?" [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

Did he know a lot about the stuff?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Oh, law, you don't know. He really did know. If he'd see you doing something wrong, he'd tell you in a minute. [Laughter] He'd come through twice a day, to say good morning to the men. He came through there about eight-thirty, and about eleven o'clock he'd be back unknown around.

PATTY DILLEY:

Oh, goodness.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Well, when he was coming through, unknown he'd always speak to you. If he happened to see you doing something wrong, he'd tell you. Speaking of making church pews and all, we made opera chairs, too, theater furniture. And folding chairs. A lot of them little plain chairs, and some of them would be padded. They'd really look nice.

PATTY DILLEY:

So you did a little upholstering there, too, at Southern Desk.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. And then we made all kinds of. . . . During the War, a plant like that had to make a lot of material for the War, and we made a lot of stakes. And I just can't think of what-all we did make. Something about a boat. I forget what they call them now, to fasten the ropes. I know I done it on the automatic shaper, cut out just little blocks and shape them out by hand. We made a lot of them things. We made tables to fold parachutes on. Made hundreds of them. They'd go to camps where soldiers trained. I'll show you one of the opera chairs I made. Now, that was a long time ago.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

He'd been away from home right much. And I'd have to control the children. We had five.

PATTY DILLEY:

So you were kind of in charge of . . .

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

The home when he was a-working. I always had supper ready when he'd get there, before quitting times.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did you ever take his meals up to him at the plant?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

No, that would be way ten miles back over there, when

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Page 24

he'd be over there to Hickory.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

This is one of the cheapest ones. [He shows the opera chair.] I sawed a many one of these out and put them on that panel saw. We'd have them stacked up—there were six in a stack—and run them on through this little old chamber; it'd carry them on through itself.

PATTY DILLEY:

Would they make the metal frame for the chair there, too?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No, they didn't. They ordered the pipe, and then they'd cut it off and maybe put it together.

PATTY DILLEY:

How would they give the piece in there a bend like that?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

They got forms and pressed a press down. They'd glue this together; that's just thin stuff there.

PATTY DILLEY:

Oh, it's several layers glued together?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, it is. They'd put it down and put glue on each piece, and they'd clamp about six seats down together and form. . . . This is like your seat Underneath and on top, and then there's a big leg comes down and holds it down for about three hours. When the glue dries, it's ready to take out and saw up.

PATTY DILLEY:

So it's all in the right shape and everything.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

And then before we got that automatic shaper, we shaped it out. You'd have to put it on the trim saws; the panel sizer would just shape it all around here.

PATTY DILLEY:

So that would take out some of the skills that the other unknown people would be using. The machine would take it.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Before we got the shaper, they'd have to take it and run it on the panel sizer, and then they'd take it over to the band saw and have to have a markout boy to mark it out. And then the bandsaw man would have to . . .

PATTY DILLEY:

Would cut along the line.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. And then we'd have to take it to the router and smooth it

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Page 25

up all around. But that shaper done away with all of that. But we run them a long time before we got the shaper.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

That's an old yard chair he made that we use outside.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

We made lots and lots of them.

PATTY DILLEY:

What are some of the changes that you've seen in the plants since World War II?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I know one thing: we didn't get to work much, only war supplies. When we wasn't doing that, they made lots of little old toys. In fact, Mr. Ivey got up a thing to make wooden tires. You know, you couldn't get tires back then a lot of times, and we made wooden tires and put on a car, but it didn't prove out too good. [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

It's kind of a rough ride.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

This was when they had dirt roads.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

unknown Well, they didn't have all dirt roads, but it didn't prove out too good. He just wanted to try it. We always try something new. And we got pretty well by through a lot of the stuff. But that didn't work out much. Just lots and lots of things we made, and I just can't think what-all it was.

PATTY DILLEY:

In between doing the war supplies?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. Didn't run out of no church pews back then. We'd make five million things. Like I said, anything that the government would need, we'd try to make it there.

PATTY DILLEY:

What kinds of things did you like to make the most?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Church pews.

PATTY DILLEY:

Were they easy to make, or fun to make?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Well, they wasn't too hard. They wasn't as much work as some other kind of furniture. Wasn't so much different pieces. Let's see, you

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Page 26

had your back and the seat. Then you had your ends and seat rest and base, arm rests.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did they ever do any fancy carving?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Oh, yes. Like church pews and pulpit furniture, that was all carved by hand. They'd have nice scroll-things on it. We made lots of them. There was several churches here in Hickory got our furniture. There's a big Baptist church in Lynchburg, Virginia. Once in a while we unknown would get big orders. We made that. That was a big church; I've forgot how many hundred people it holds.

PATTY DILLEY:

Have you gone out in churches and seen work that you've done?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, I have. That's right. When we got our pews, that Clapp fellow got me to go with him. He knew I knowed a lot about the church furniture, and so I went and helped him pick out what he wanted. When they decided on that, taken the order to Mr. Ivey, and you know, he give us a big discount on it, by me working over there.

PATTY DILLEY:

What church did you belong to, or what church did you grow up in?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

The Methodist. You know where Rhodhiss is? We go over there.

PATTY DILLEY:

Is it called Rhodhiss Methodist Church?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. Rhodhiss United Methodist Church. [Points to photograph.] There's a picture of the Church. We made pews over there, too.

PATTY DILLEY:

Were you brought up in the Lutheran Church?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Oh, yes, ever since I was three weeks old.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did you switch over when you were married?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Yes, after we had the children. Their schoolmates was going to his church, and they wanted to go to his church, so I told him, "Well, I'll just go with you." So we've been going to the Methodist Church ever since.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

You can't hardly [have] the wife go to one church and the man the other. It's best they all go to one church, I think.

PATTY DILLEY:

What's the difference between the Lutheran and the Methodist church?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

It's a right smart difference.

PATTY DILLEY:

What are some of the differences?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Well. . . . What are the mostly difference between the two churches?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

I don't see that much difference.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

The Lutherans has closed communion, and the Methodists has open.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

We've got Catholics; we've got Baptists; we've got Methodists and Lutherans, all in our family. If they're happy in their church, we're happy with them.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

The Lutherans don't believe in a lot of things that the Methodists do, and the Methodists don't believe a lot of things they do. The Methodists has unknown full baptism; the Lutherans don't. But like we all say, the church is not going to save you; it's the way you live. One denomination's no better than the other. We go to the Lutheran Church, the Baptist; we like to visit around. We went out to our son's in Wichita, Kansas, and we went to their church. They're Catholic. I didn't get much out of that. It's quite different.

PATTY DILLEY:

You all have five children?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Five; four boys and one girl. The girl lives next to us over here. One boy lives in Oklahoma City and one is living down in Lexington, Kentucky, and one in Lexington, North Carolina, and one in Gastonia.

PATTY DILLEY:

What did they end up doing for a living?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

The boy in Oklahoma City is an accountant for a big oil company. They drill oil wells. They drilled about ninety-some wells last year, he said. The boy in Kentucky is a Tom's Peanuts distributor. He's got a big territory; he has thirteen trucks there. He's got a real good business.

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Page 28

The boy in Lexington, North Carolina, is in the auto part business. He's the manager of a large auto part company there. My other boy is in a machine shop, running lathes. Metal turning.

PATTY DILLEY:

They turn metal parts?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

That's right.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did he get any of that from you, learning how to work with machines?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

He worked with Southern Desk. I'd learn him how to run that panel sizer. He kind of fell out with their foreman and went to Cramerton, North Carolina, near Gastonia, and worked in that Burlington Mill. He was there about twenty years. They sold out and went to the bad, and so he went to the machine shop then. In the meantime he was a foreman down there all the time in the slasher room. I don't know what that is; maybe you do.

PATTY DILLEY:

I sort of know. I've heard the job mentioned a lot.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Anyway, he was the foreman in there for about twenty-some years. When they closed the mill down, he got the job at the machine shop.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did any of your other sons ever go to work with you at any of the places that you worked at?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

They all did. Every one.

PATTY DILLEY:

What kind of jobs would they get?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Marking for the band saw and then tailing the ripsaw. Harold, the one at Gastonia, run the panel sizer. And then I believe the oldest boy, the band saw. They all didn't stay too long.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did they want to look towards better things, or what? Why didn't they want to stay?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

They didn't like it. They wanted to change.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

It was too confining for them there, and they wanted to be out.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Three of them went in the service. So when they came back, they went to school. All of them finished high school, and two or three

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Page 29

of them went to college then. They never did charge them.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did your daughter ever do any public work before she was married?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, she worked in the hosiery mill a while.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

And then she worked in Sally's store.

PATTY DILLEY:

Doing sales work?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Yes.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

She went over to Sears a while. She don't like that much. Her husband's a mail carrier. He don't want her to work, says, "If you work, I have to pay so much more income tax." [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

Does she like to work?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. She's got a little job over here at the market. She just works part-time. Says she gets tired of loafing around all the time, but she went over there. I'm working twelve hours a week. [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

Over across the street? [At the crossroads store]

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. I enjoy it. I've got so many friends I know over there. They're so nice to us. They've been nice people to work for.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

He told the boss that we wanted to go spend some time in Florida this past winter. His wife baked him a nice cake and gave it to him when he left from over there and said, "Now we want you when you come back, for sure.".

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Sent us a nice Christmas card.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

They're so good to him.

PATTY DILLEY:

Do you all think you raised your kids different than your parents raised you?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

They didn't have to work like we did in the farm. You see, nowadays they don't farm like they used to. Dad would have us hoeing the corn when it was in silk and tassel [unclear] [Laughter] Going after the plow unknown, taking out maybe a little bunch of grass here and there.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Just wasting time.

PATTY DILLEY:

Just something to keep you working.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Yes, to keep us busy.

PATTY DILLEY:

So you didn't make your children do that.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

No, but we wasn't farming much. Well, when ours was littler, we tended unknown my daddy's land and raised cotton, and it was so rocky. Whenever you'd try to hoe it, dig out a bunch of grass, well, you'd dig out the whole cotton and all. You'd hit a rock, and about break your arm. [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

This was while you all were married?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Oh, yes.

PATTY DILLEY:

So you did a little bit of farming.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

I had to take the children and go to the field. I didn't have to, but we did, and he worked over there. We had to kind of kind of ends meet like that, for he didn't make much.

[TAPE 1, SIDE B]

[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Take any woman the age of two and eighty years old, forgets. I can't remember things like I used to.

PATTY DILLEY:

A lot of times, I find people remember more about the things I ask them about than they do what happened last year.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, that's right. I can think of way back yonder better than I can yesterday.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

That's the way with me.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I still, I think, forget a lot of things.

PATTY DILLEY:

Do you think that because you all didn't do a whole lot of farming, that your kids were able to go through school and finish school?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Oh, yes. Before, way back there, I don't

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Page 31

remember of anybody finishing school and going to college when I was growing up.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

There was a few, but most of them . . .

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

There might have been a few, but I don't remember of any.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did your parents kind of encourage you, as soon as you got a good enough education, to go to work?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

They just wasn't able to send us to school. My dad made our shoes, and Mother knit our stockings. And we wore aprons with long sleeves and buttoned plumb to the back, down to the bottom. That's what kind of dresses we wore, and just with nothing but a sweater, and had freezing cold and snow knee deep. We had to wade through it. That's what we wore.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did you like school?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

No, I didn't. [Laughter] It seemed like I had. . . . Well, with all them children to help raise, it wasn't in me.

PATTY DILLEY:

You were more interested in helping the family.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Yes. It seemed like we'd have to have that to help out.

PATTY DILLEY:

How many years did you go through?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

I quit when I was fifteen years old. Way back there then, they just had four hours a day in that school.

PATTY DILLEY:

And this was just during the winter?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Yes. November and December and January and February. Dad had a big patch of woods, and we cleared that. When we come home from school, they'd say, "Now you children get your mattocks and get down there and drill [unclear] out them there stumps." [Laughter] And so we did, and we had just a little lamp to study by. A lot of times just pine knots to study

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PATTY DILLEY:

You would light pine knots?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

And you couldn't half see, and my eyes wasn't too good at that. I didn't learn much, for I couldn't see how to study. [Laughter]

PATTY DILLEY:

How far did you get through school, Mr. Meyers?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I went to the seventh grade.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did you like school?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Not too good. I was kind of like her. I had to go to work to help my daddy support the children. But I liked it pretty good. Before we moved up here in Catawba County I went to Mooresville School, a nice school there, and I went more there than I did up here. [Laughter] That was a real good school there.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

When you moved up here, didn't they put you way back?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No, that was when we went to Mooresville. Went to a Rowan County school down there, and they had me up to seventh grade there, and they put me back to the high first one. [Laughter] Told me they just pushed me through there.

PATTY DILLEY:

Why were there those differences in the schools?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

They wasn't much teachers out there in the country. But that town school, they really was strict.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did your family move from in the country to town anytime?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. I was born and raised in Salisbury, and I was three years old when we moved up to Mount Olive; that was close to Mooresville. And we were there several years. Then we did move into town, in Mooresville.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

His mother died when he was three years old. Had two stepmothers then.

PATTY DILLEY:

How were your stepmothers?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

My first one was real nice to me, just the same as my mother had been. I couldn't say that about the last one too good.

PATTY DILLEY:

[Laughter] So your father really did need somebody to look after. . . .

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, he did.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

He liked the women, didn't he? [Laughter]

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

He had four children and he couldn't support them, so I just had to quit, and that's when I went to High Point and went to work in Hickory Chair. I give him most all of my money till after we got married, which I didn't after we got married.

PATTY DILLEY:

When you all moved into town, what did your father do for a living?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

He run a furniture shop. He was a schoolteacher a long time, but with that he didn't make much money back then, four months out of the year. He started making furniture. I helped him some.

PATTY DILLEY:

So he had a little cabinet shop, I guess?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, he did. He had machinery, and unknown lots of different things.

PATTY DILLEY:

So you boarded in High Point and sent money back.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Sent the money to him. Grandpa come to find out I was giving him money, he'd send a check. I didn't have no bank account.

PATTY DILLEY:

So you didn't ever see it, really, in your hands.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

That's right, except maybe I'd keep a dollar out, maybe every three or four weeks for what I'd need. Ten or fifteen cents went a way back then. That's about all I got to spend.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

All the time we was in Newton and working, I never seen a penny that I made. It all went in Daddy's check, and he'd take it and put it in the savings and loan. unknown And I didn't even have a penny to go to the movies.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Her mammy didn't work, and about four or five of them drew seventy-five dollars.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

It was Dad and myself and Jake and Marge, and Lee part of the time.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

That was during World War I, and I was about packed to go.

The day I was to reexamine, the Armistice was signed and I didn't have to go. I went to Camp Abraham Eustis, Virginia, and worked as a carpenter out there. I was just a young fellow then. And I made seventy-five dollars a week just myself, and they all just got seventy-five. [Laughter]

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

And I thought I was doing well making twenty dollars a week.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I was able to help my daddy out then. I started in in June and worked till October. I took the flu up there and like to died. You know, back then flu was really. . . . It was influenza; they'd call it "flu." And I had it bad.

PATTY DILLEY:

You had it when you were out in Fort Eustis?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Virginia, yes. I did make good out there.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did you send him the money home?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. It was about five dollars a week. I had to pay board out there. That was five dollars a week, and I kept five out for spending, and sent the rest to him.

PATTY DILLEY:

How did you find out about that?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

I had a friend out there in the Navy.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

And he wrote him and had him to come out there.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

He got me a job.

PATTY DILLEY:

Gosh, I bet they were paid. The Army, I guess, pays pretty good for stuff like that.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

unknown Well, that did. I don't think the boys in service got too much. I just about had to go unknown the examining board. They signed the Armistice right before I had to go.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did you have two other brothers that were full brothers?

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

No, just one.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Two; I had two brothers.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

Oh, yes, one died when he was a baby.

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

He died when he was only a few months old.

PATTY DILLEY:

Was this when your mother died, too?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. I was four years old when she passed away.

PATTY DILLEY:

Did your father immediately get married after that?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

No. I don't know how long after my mother died, thirteen years, I guess.

PATTY DILLEY:

Do you know how he took care of you all?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

My brother stayed with his Grandfather Meyers, that fellow I mentioned. He lived up in Iredell County. I stayed with my aunt. She lived close by there. That was my dad's sister. They kept us till he got married. No, I don't think it was that long. It must have been two and a half or. . . . It wasn't too long that I lived with my aunt, and him was his grandfather. About a year and a half. And then the next time, after she passed away, it was a couple years before he found his last wife.

PATTY DILLEY:

Was this brother of yours older than you?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes, four years older.

PATTY DILLEY:

What did he end up doing as a job?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Drinking. He got run over and died of pneumonia. He was a good mechanic, but he messed it up too bad.

PATTY DILLEY:

How old was he when he died?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

About '78.

PATTY DILLEY:

It was in 1978?

FLAKE ORAN MEYERS:

Yes. I figure it was then.

NELLIE MAE WORKMAN MEYERS:

He was drinking and got out in the road, and somebod