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adminAugust 24, 2021

Jessie Harris



Madelyn McClarey [00:00:02] My name is Madelyn McClarey. I’m here from Florida A&M University on February 15, 2020, and I’m here with the Graduate Studies History Department and I will be recording today a native of Apalachicola. So here we are.

 

Jessie Harris [00:00:22] My name is Jessie Harris. I’m from Apalachicola, Florida, born 1946, December the 12th. I had a birthday on last month, month before last.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:00:35] Keep talking…

 

Jessie Harris [00:00:40] Well I was staying with my great grandmother Jessie Lane, we had the wash pots. We had to wash clothes in the wash pots. We rubbed our clothes on the rub board. Close on the global tinta with the water pump, the wall we had to head. She had a pump, we had to pump the water and then we had a big old Carus big old heater with the oven on. We had to oh my great grandfather had let it get the wood, the oak wood.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:01:14] Oh and what’s his name.

 

Jessie Harris [00:01:17] My great grandfather name, Herbert Lane.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:01:19] OK, and your grandmother.

 

Jessie Harris [00:01:21] My great grandmother was named Jessie Lane.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:01:23] OK.

 

Jessie Harris [00:01:29] I was staying with them until I got thirteen years old because of the welfare then I had to move back home with my momma. Because of their old age, they didn’t want me to mess up their checks.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:01:42] OK.

 

Jessie Harris [00:01:44] So, so I remember all these old houses album. All these old houses down town.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:01:52] Can you tell me about, like your favorite street in Apalachicola.

 

Jessie Harris [00:01:57] Ma’am…

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:01:57] Tell me about, like, one of your favorite streets from Apalachicola.

 

Jessie Harris [00:02:02] Well the streets. Well during that time we had the.. I wasn’t too many oyster shells and nothing but dirt… but the dirt roads.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:02:05] OK. Tell me about that.

 

Jessie Harris [00:02:05] We had dirt roads through the alley, we had to go through the alleys. They don’t do that no more. It ain’t too much I can remember… All I can remember is about the dirt. Then I didn’t go to the jooks too much because my great grand father didn’t allow that. But remember during them times I had to go to bed six o’clock at night time and wake up in the morning and we had family prayer on sunday mornings, they didn’t let us go to church until we have family prayer. During that time we didn’t cook on Sundays. She cooked, she’d do her cooking on Saturday. Everything on Saturday, you didn’t wash, we didn’t do nothing on Sundays but go to church.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:03:22] And what church did you go to?

 

Jessie Harris [00:03:24] During that time I was going to African American, Saint Paul A.M.E. Church. They prounced it then. That’s where I was raised up at. Under (Gail?) then she died. Until they died. then I moved to another church now. Now I’m in a Holiness church.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:03:42] OK, and tell me about what that was like at that particular time. Did you enjoy that type of family life? Tell me what

 

Jessie Harris [00:03:57] you. Oh, come on. My family. Yeah, well, yes, ma’am. We talk about them because you see the dating every step on a slow. You know, I had a long day ahead of where I’m sitting in that meeting with my and makes it in. And they were pretty discreet. Yeah. We didn’t go at that. They didn’t I mean, to go out at night and go out at night and no Tamanac. I just stayed home and we didn’t have no TV to do anything to have radios.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:04:35] Were you in school at this time.

 

Jessie Harris [00:04:37] At school you did and. Oh yes.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:04:42] Our experience here,

 

Jessie Harris [00:04:43] it was like the Catholic school, Catholic school kept Catholic teachers, non teachers in the priest, Catholic priest. It wouldn’t have been affected up in the Catholic school here from the first movie before I was sixteen. Then I went in there.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:05:07] And what was that like?

 

Jessie Harris [00:05:09] Quien. Yeah, Quinnell with a whole lot different from some Catholic. Yeah. Cut her feet three and a half and then we’d have had a different baby this campus to have a bail

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:05:23] out like a church bell.

 

Jessie Harris [00:05:24] Yes. Oh I’m

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:05:26] standing here. Yes ma’am.

 

Jessie Harris [00:05:29] You have to ring seriously in being, in being really being welcomed into the carpet when we go in the campus. Do we have.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:05:38] Oh yeah. Yeah that’s right. Right, yeah.

 

Jessie Harris [00:05:41] OK, I’ll be right back with you.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:05:46] Did you find that like your school life was very different from when you went to church with your family?

 

Jessie Harris [00:05:54] Oh, yes. Yes, ma’am. But considering your family, my great grandmother beating my parents, my great grandmother and grandparents, they they send me to sixty. I went to church with them and know they took me to church. And when I hit my children, I took them to you.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:06:16] Where did you take them?

 

Jessie Harris [00:06:17] Oh, I been moved in Tallahassee. OK, and that got back to that big old Ploning and get your grandma great grandmother the day I have my oldest out now she stay with me.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:06:31] So were they also all born in Poland? No. So we go, oh ok. OK. I was trying, I was trying to connect, you know, from epaulet of. To you having children. So now I understand that, yes, how people talk to me about the way you felt growing up here. Did you feel like it was a close community in the way?

 

Jessie Harris [00:07:01] You know, in a way. I have to say I would say, if at all. And the good to convey them, I think we can get we can get them to be like me. Hey, you know that be. What do you

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:07:16] consider being so good? All these about that. Tell me about what you felt like was so good at that time about Apalachicola, where at that

 

Jessie Harris [00:07:26] time we we didn’t we didn’t like that, you know, like people go and go out and have good time. I didn’t I didn’t have that. We didn’t remember in that way races and that I couldn’t wear pants, you know, that had

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:07:47] but still you had good friendships and everything. Right. And so that’s the part about it. Oh, that’s the part about it. That was like really wonderful for you. Did you have, like, really close friends in Apalachicola?

 

Jessie Harris [00:08:05] I have. I had close friends, some of my friends with me now when I was being Catholic, when I was in here, the Catholic Church with me. They don’t they don’t you know, I don’t see too many people see us. You know, we would be someone I moved away if someone was still here.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:08:26] So when you moved back here, though, did you feel the same kind of love that you felt or the place when, you know, when you were here before? Like when when you came back to Atlanta?

 

Jessie Harris [00:08:40] You know, it was a whole you know, when I came back, let’s go to benefit. Don’t change.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:08:46] Talk to me about how you felt about that.

 

Jessie Harris [00:08:48] When you think about this, you know, I feel like, you know, I had to get used to I used to go. I had to get used to being super, not great back home. Everything everything had changed, you know, like I say, going out with my great grandmother, you know, being out with my great grandparents, they didn’t know I couldn’t go out and they didn’t like that. They you know that. But nowadays, children go left and right. And and another thing and I’m glad I’m glad they raised me. Kostia sicko’s because I’m a Christian that I’ve been out with them. They raised they raised me up in church and they came to Sunday school and said, me, we are right there in date and they have been at some school to be witness you chewing gum and, you know, and and and man, you know, it’s a whole, you know, thanks is whole not different from from from back then, you know, like you say, we can’t we can’t get them back.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:10:01] So. And what about your neighbors? Like, I know that your family, your great grandparents really loved you. I can see that they, like, really made sure that you are on a good moral path. Right. So what about your neighbors? How did how would your relationships were with your neighbors? Do you have a really good close?

 

Jessie Harris [00:10:23] We we see my break. We see my great grandmother. But she had seen supernet with Supernatural when I was a great grandmother. I didn’t have, you know, my great grandmother had you know, she had neighbors come over to her house and she takes me to go, you know, go out and play. But Behati came here to kick. They’ll be back before they going to be fair to ask whether they’ll be going forward, though, if I don’t if it’s a B, if I be at the four o’clock and they told me I’ve been asked if they had get into the house, you know, they disagree because I go to bed at six o’clock and they go they put me to bed early, like I say, you know. Right. Right. Yeah, it really is. They really, really cutting out, you know, like I say, they adopted me. They adopted me from my my mom when I was a baby. They give me they get me when I was three months old. And and I’m glad I’m glad that the Miklosi, they you know, if they they they would, you know, will and they they they. No. Oh, how they hate chickens, they kill the chickens deep inside the house. Yes, ma’am. You know, if you have chicken egg acrobatics, right?

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:12:01] So you really were raised on the land in Apalachicola. And I think that’s beautiful. I have relatives in North Carolina who were raised the same way. So I think that’s a really special kind

 

Jessie Harris [00:12:14] of chicken and veto it. We’ve all had the snap, but don’t them that they would take a date with, you know, I remember them. You know, they don’t fear them.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:12:25] Right. But you remember all of those years. That’s amazing.

 

Jessie Harris [00:12:30] Yes. Like I say, I’m saying three years old. And so but

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:12:37] let’s say you make really good friends. Ma’am, did you have good friendships here in Apalachicola?

 

Jessie Harris [00:12:42] Yes, ma’am. And I still got good friendships. Me and my girlfriend, me and my girlfriend, both al Qaeda, we we grew up with friends, classmates in the media. So tell

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:12:57] me about

 

Jessie Harris [00:12:58] that. And she said we was in the same place we grew up together and be. When I come back, we see obviously. Yes, ma’am. That is amazing. That’s so no hardship. And I hope some of those years I’ve been through here just like this and we still some of

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:13:18] your friends, but you’re more like sisters.

 

Jessie Harris [00:13:21] Yes. My eight year old is really happy and I love what he did to me about all the children, they think.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:13:32] And that’s what I was asked. So because you were talking about that, you guys, the two of you, I’m sorry for calling you guys like I do that sometimes, but you ladies. So you were kind of brings together you moved away, came back, and we still were inseparable. You had a really good well, have a really good friendship. And then for you to be taking part in helping raise the children. Tell me what that was like. How how you helped her out. Yeah. Tell me tell me what made you want to do that?

 

Jessie Harris [00:14:09] You know, see, I mean, have been friends, you know, and she and she actually, you know, you know, take your kids. She was she work, you know, in banking. And I mean, if you stay at home, take care of most of those. Your grandkid got her daughter back in September and I hope to take them to cheer.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:14:33] OK, OK. So what you’re saying then, you know, is that you were her friend, are her friend. I keep saying we’re if

 

Jessie Harris [00:14:42] e-mail me not only just hope I’m I’m just not sure

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:14:50] that you can keep telling her

 

Jessie Harris [00:14:51] family. I mean, her children will share that with my dad. We know that they held my daughter pretty bad to use me.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:15:01] So you created an extended family, which is beautiful. So I’m sure that, you know, you have all types of like beautiful memories of the kids growing up this way about your daughter. You were you were telling me

 

Jessie Harris [00:15:17] now my daughter. Now, my daughter, she didn’t know she she she didn’t finish she didn’t finish school because she did. She went to night school and great, great to see great, great films with the name of the school at my school in Tallahassee. I couldn’t call a name of that nice. It’s a nice school. She she she grew up in Tallahassee. So she graduated USC grade. Yes, man. She had a baby. She had a grandbaby. OK, nice. Oh start with the C for the name of it is like to call it on. The community community,

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:16:03] not TCC, huh, TCC, S.C., Tallahassee Community

 

Jessie Harris [00:16:07] College is a net.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:16:10] OK, I think I know where you’re talking to. It’s like lively tech or something.

 

Jessie Harris [00:16:14] Yes. People can go in that and behave like technical skills and see how the night finishes when they said,

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:16:26] that’s so wonderful. So you talk to me about how it was growing up as a young girl. Then you talk to me about how you helped your best friend become more empowered, right? That’s what you did. You helped her carry on.

 

Jessie Harris [00:16:44] Yes. And I’ve been in that business. I’ve been a Christian from from from being up until, you know, to a close knit. I close my heart beat that day at work when they get in behind when I come back to Christ. Been 20 some years and you’ve just been back, say yeah.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:17:07] And you’ve been a wonderful support to years.

 

Jessie Harris [00:17:10] Right. I was a saint in the ambush and everything in

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:17:15] the church here.

 

Jessie Harris [00:17:17] Now, in my church, you see a new life,

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:17:20] new life church. How long have you been affiliated?

 

Jessie Harris [00:17:24] How long have you been in new life? On and off at Tamburlaine Machoism Panagariya. It’s my third Assisi to see the secretary and a mom who sang in the choir. We all say she’s singing.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:17:38] That is

 

Jessie Harris [00:17:39] amazing. And I would be in the choir tomorrow.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:17:42] So you’re from a musical family man. Does your you have a lot of family members who love to sing.

 

Jessie Harris [00:17:48] Just a matter of just my mom, my family members just from here. Yes. But my point

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:17:54] is, what is it

 

Jessie Harris [00:17:56] about seeing things in the club and sing with cranapple? And when I moved when I lived in that song that he is singing

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:18:05] in your face is lighting up like we say that that must be like your favorite thing to do. Is that one of your favorite things to do to sing.

 

Jessie Harris [00:18:14] My favorite thing to sing.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:18:16] To sing in the choir. You love to do that. Oh, I love to sing. Yeah. Because your face is like

 

Jessie Harris [00:18:23] saying same thing. Singing.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:18:24] What did you sing as a child as well.

 

Jessie Harris [00:18:28] Yes. My last thing is that people really.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:18:31] Yes man. So can you recall. Like what. Like your favorite song was when you were younger, when you were a kid. You can recall one of those songs. Some of them were like one song that you love.

 

Jessie Harris [00:18:47] Oh, Jesus, love me, love me. This I know. You know, they sang the song at the assembly for Jesus. You sang is

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:18:58] me. So what did that make you feel like when you were a child, though? Like what feelings did it gives you, especially like being in an atmosphere like this,

 

Jessie Harris [00:19:09] but to CPAC nowadays, you know, mission that unless they can sing them and they get beat up, you know, are beep so they don’t sing like, you know, like, like, like Jesus. Let me look for him. We have indeed that we about we say that now we sing that like, you know, we we think that we have these amazing grace and elegance. You saying that, but not like it used to. You know what I mean?

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:19:39] It’s really interesting that you said that, you know, the Black History songs. And I just I think that’s so beautiful because I think sometimes people singing and they don’t even realize how important it is, like certain songs, how it really changes your mood and it makes you feel more proud of who you are. So tell me about one of the songs, the Black History song that you were just talking about. Like tell me which song you would go to make. Oh, let me see.

 

Jessie Harris [00:20:10] Now we come this far by faith leaning on the Lord in the black is in. Intimate. Now, Amazing Grace. It was a it was a it was it was the man that felt that that song again, the book I got the book got the book of with me singing Amazing Grace. I see it on the radio. They said he was he was only Sigbrit when he wrote the song. He was on his sickbed when he wrote the song and he wrote Amazing Grace.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:20:49] How sweet that’s really is. I found that out recently too. Pretty recently too, because I didn’t know that dreams are about the song. So I feel like asking for somebody else.

 

Jessie Harris [00:21:06] And then we we come this far by faith, leaning on the heart and the extent to turn around. But we.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:21:15] And so when you think about music like that and you think about how you were fortunate to grow up in a place like this where you could like you were saying, you could have live chickens and grow your own food and things like that. And now you see Apalachicola, you know, as a different it has a different geography, a little bit because of the houses, the new houses being more endemic.

 

Jessie Harris [00:21:42] You know, nothing. You see, we can you know, the thing I forget about that. But not doing him doing my day, we didn’t have that much of country house. So where was your house? Yes. And the country has been in a lot of time. A great grandmother, Namal Gulak, Bill, and yes, no trees and everything gone up the tree. And they had a team that that ti that people would call.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:22:18] Is it something to

 

Jessie Harris [00:22:19] that effect, Betty, at things that people I think that the one that did get the fever, you could feel they had my great grandmother had it out around the yard and she and she didn’t have to go, you know, she didn’t have to go to that. In fact been Laden didn’t have to go to much to the hospital because they, you know, they adopted the from country have in it and that. And being in Vietnam now, I’m just like, you get what’s called this air defense, you know that you have to get the script right. But then we didn’t do anything. We didn’t have to beg for the air date that was really good for and anything but not Vietnam, Vietnam, be everything. Vietnam kept giving it description for doing it and getting it right. So, man, I’m sorry to say, the rabbit, tobacco, the yellow. Yes. My great grandfather. He’s going to get a rabbit back and come back and behold it.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:23:38] I’ve heard about that from North Carolina.

 

Jessie Harris [00:23:41] Yes, man, it’s really big.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:23:45] You see, my pocketbook right. Is right here, OK?

 

Jessie Harris [00:23:48] Yes.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:23:50] It’s really beautiful to look back to be able to look back through your experiences and see that, you know, Apalachicola had so many things that were free, that were flourishing and growing and without what you said, having to always go to a doctor, having to go to school. So talk to me about how most of the people were around you.

 

Jessie Harris [00:24:15] People wouldn’t act around, you know, not, you know, like like you say, we didn’t have to do. We could we could leave our dogs up on the porch. We have free aspirin. Once our house, we go to church weekly. I don’t want my grandma to go down, lead, don’t open. You will not do that. Not better luck. You don’t have to do it. But you really don’t need intellect. And you’re like, my God. Like, go, you go. We have a next door neighbor. Whatever happens, you know, with the idea. The what. You know that anyway, when no stealing going braconnier and doing it Danco a week sleep on the porch, you know, on the front porch window breaking.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:25:06] So life has really changed tremendously. Tell me about things, because I know that you told me that you moved away and then you will back. Tell me about things that you still really do love about Apalachicola, even though you know so much has changed. Tell me things that make you feel really

 

Jessie Harris [00:25:28] at home any way shape. When I moved back home with my mom, you know, it was different. You know, it was a different place, you know, because my mom had, um, my mom had worked. She she had worked for she had worked day and night in my bed, you

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:25:46] know, so. OK, so what was your mother’s name?

 

Jessie Harris [00:25:50] That somebody chaperoning Emil Jones? Yes. She had married because she decided, OK, she had 15 years here and she daddy Shabbat

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:26:03] and your your father,

 

Jessie Harris [00:26:05] my father, my father, my mother, my father and my father come back. He got sick and he died and they buried him out here in Apalachicola to my father and he got sick to get us. So he he he’s. Yes, he did, too,

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:26:25] and and what was his name? Robert Jones. Robert Jones. OK. I’m just trying to get your

 

Jessie Harris [00:26:31] name to be withdrawn. OK, so let’s a lot of money and then just make jokes about merit in my name. His hair is my Casamayor. Oh, OK. And my husband, my husband back in 1990. And if he had that we’d been together. We’ve been married other 30 some years if he hadn’t. So, so. So we’ve been together. And that is beautiful. Yes.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:27:00] What about. So he was from Epaulet. You know, when I’m

 

Jessie Harris [00:27:04] going to move to Tallahassee, he was like, oh, he was from a loose in a place where it’s in my God, my mom put us together. Yes, ma’am.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:27:18] Yes, ma’am. So, I mean, even though he’s not here now, you were so fortunate to have that long relationship is beautiful.

 

Jessie Harris [00:27:28] Yes, ma’am. I see, I see. I married a married man in Domenikos because, you know, what’s the one thing he’s only been outside since? I mean, Christ, I don’t think no man, no one map. And I’m not looking for no, because not many around here and, you know, they you know, they they when they go down like that, all the world has changed. Tell me about it. Yes. They want a woman to take you down.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:28:06] It’s a lot

 

Jessie Harris [00:28:09] in my home and my husband, William, my honeymoon, he didn’t want me to he had to choose. I had to meet him when we put him on the way up and he told me, he told me so we name one of my children and we along with a. Yeah. He work in Tokyo every day. Is that something you want to put that’s on welfare? You know, Inamed on his Social Security net. Yes, he did. On his Social Security.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:28:40] He looked out for you anyway.

 

Jessie Harris [00:28:42] This man. Yes, he took care. He took care of me.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:28:47] Now, I mean that, you know, you I see the way that you glow when you talk about it. Yes, that’s it.

 

Jessie Harris [00:28:56] It will be your attempt to get one. And we will you will be just like that to his family right there.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:29:05] So what are you. I’m going to let you go. I know you still want to enjoy your. That’s so nice out there and.

 

Jessie Harris [00:29:12] No, no, no, no, no, no more friends that went down. And then I’m going, oh, yeah. Abandonments. You got so many here. I mean that, you know. Yeah.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:29:24] So in closing, I just want to know, like, what is the number, if you could if you could think of one or two things that you still just really love about Apalachicola, what would it be?

 

Jessie Harris [00:29:38] Oh, well, we don’t you know, Apalachicola, you know, see, it doesn’t it doesn’t get out that much because see you eating too many people. You know, like I say, I’m a Christian in that I’m by myself of it. And I don’t like that. I don’t go in the world. I don’t do the work that I do and I don’t do to be elected. Stay home and bless the gospel Lesnik, gospel music, then the pictures on TV and whatever. Because when you put back, I say, I don’t be here unless I’m going to the store and go right back home to see that. Like I like to say the word, the word got out that everything I need to go and you know, and I’m not mad yet, but I’m not looking for nobody, you know.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:30:31] So you think that your childhood. Right. Really reared you to be even though you had your different experiences and everything, it just really made you feel. How can I say it made you come back like full circle. Yes. Right. To what you’ve always known.

 

Jessie Harris [00:30:55] Yes, ma’am. Yes, ma’am. Much is too much. Because like I say like I say, I’m going ahead. I’m glad I have a great mom, including what I see day to day, because she goes to stay with my mom. I had kids being at Jukin and everything. Beñat doing everything at once, both doing, you know, with efficient system only, you know, the mole here, you couldn’t do it, you couldn’t have looked at it, have no boyfriend, no nothing like that. And, you

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:31:29] know, but you have so much confidence in intelligence. And so I can see that they really took their time to give you everything that they help out other people in the community like that man that they look out for other people in the community who your great grandparents,

 

Jessie Harris [00:31:46] obviously unbaked what they do. And I see. And they’ll cherish what they do know. People don’t know more of what they are doing. Some man is sick, sick on Sundays and they need church. They are taken they have taken some food. They need a bath. If they are to go, you know, take them, give them away for, you know, go in. And if they don’t be insured, they have to be a go to the house and take what they can be half and half church to the house, you know, pray with them, sing with them. But they don’t do it in that day. And that, I guess, is almost in the world, you know, so much happening where people steal and stealing, they don’t even hate it no more.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:32:36] So your grandparents, parents, your great grandparents are there, right? They were a real asset to the community. They were real assets to the community. They really helped not just you. They might be

 

Jessie Harris [00:32:53] able to kill me.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:32:54] Tell me their names again.

 

Jessie Harris [00:32:55] My name is just a hair

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:32:58] and tell me a great grandparents name.

 

Jessie Harris [00:33:00] Elaine Sheila. One name and they met her just name and her name was her

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:33:06] name and they. And what church were they attending.

 

Jessie Harris [00:33:09] They would tend to St. Paul African St. Paul AME Church. Wonderful yes-man so that stayed with them until I got thirteen years old, got welfare you know welfare come in and they did. They want me cut off they shit because they go on welfare as shit. So I had to move back home to my mama. So I come. They say all good things must come to a union. Inequality.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:33:36] How the system really changed the situation room. Yes ma’am. They gave you so many great gifts when you were with them.

 

Jessie Harris [00:33:45] Yes, ma’am. They, you know, in any way at. Oh, my great grandmother had me by my hand, you know, in the what was Africa, you know, in everything they adore and love. And another thing she she was she taught me, you take me to the stone pyramid. Don’t don’t don’t pick up. Let you know the pick. And then I came back, she, she taught me a lot and I had it in mind to put that in my chair and someone mature and when they it. Yes.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:34:16] Yeah. So they set the moral code for you. Yes, ma’am.

 

Jessie Harris [00:34:19] You bring them down to the family. No family’s generation. Yeah. Yeah. And you’re a wonderful person. I see it as if they live in a nearby to tell you about me. And I’m the first thing they give birth, they come up with a game. The view is, that’s awesome.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:34:40] I really feel like this has been a gift for me today, talking with you, because I really feel how your spirit it really is showing you how you feel about the community. Still like the things that you learned, how your you are sharing kind of person. And I really appreciate taking

 

Jessie Harris [00:35:03] the time, but CNN really, really my great grandmother told me, she always told me, I don’t care where you let go, keep the love of God, me take with me. So that’s what I do. I you know, and I have to logo with me. We have go. Yeah, we have some let me tell the panel. I don’t I don’t see God almost here. But, you know, look, taking with me.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:35:26] That’s amazing. Is that love. And can you tell me again, like where the house was that you grew up in with your great grandparents? It’s right there now.

 

Jessie Harris [00:35:39] Sixth grade. They have, like their culture,

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:35:44] Sixth Street, OK,

 

Jessie Harris [00:35:46] right? That’s right.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:35:49] Yeah. We came through I was

 

Jessie Harris [00:35:51] in the house on in the house, on the left. My level of student loans.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:35:56] And what’s the what’s our whole name. Lullo. Delois Roberson. OK, Dolores Robinson,

 

Jessie Harris [00:36:02] you stay right off screen. That has to be that big, big house green.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:36:07] That’s amazing. I’m going to look for that when we go back out.

 

Jessie Harris [00:36:10] Yes, ma’am. You see, it is right there. This is. It might be a Greek exit poll. OK, we go ask al Qaeda, her name with the last war was I will look for you house. I was staying in a.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:36:25] Oh, that’s.

 

Jessie Harris [00:36:26] Oh, it’s in the family run in families. You get back, you stay home. And I hope in my office.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:36:33] And that’s in black history right there. Keeping your

 

Jessie Harris [00:36:37] plan. Yes, ma’am. Yes, ma’am. That’s why I was just here to this way I would leave and I’m right there with her. Right. Did my great grandmother’s house.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:36:46] How does it feel knowing that their house stayed in your family?

 

Jessie Harris [00:36:49] But, you know, it makes me feel good. You know, if I go to

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:36:53] her house,

 

Jessie Harris [00:36:55] I think about my great grandmother and think about how I think about our little challenge coming up. Growing up in, you know, in that house is

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:37:04] know it’s a gift to

 

Jessie Harris [00:37:05] write me. Man, when you go back to St. Paul, you see the house, right?

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:37:10] You see the screen right now. You said it’s green.

 

Jessie Harris [00:37:13] It’s green. Now I’m going to look for it’s green. It’s right there. Right there. Probably think about it and, you know, and it’s got a garage on it and you know, and you’ve got to make no thank you. You got to make note. She said you came with a lot of flowers in her book you can’t miss right now.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:37:35] As you know, you’re going to try to take a picture by

 

Jessie Harris [00:37:37] there, OK, Ratman? Yes, ma’am. That is so. I mean, that’s my my my my sister, my my my baby sister city.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:37:45] So, you know, right now, in a time where people are moving in and, like, buying up a lot of different properties, you guys have been you ladies, I’m sorry, you keep saying you guys it’s a habit, but you ladies have been so prosperous because you still maintained your family home. That’s really black history at its highest. Yes, I love that. Yes. Yeah. So I’m going to close out now because I know that you, you know, have other things to do. So my name is Madeline McClary and I am speaking with Jesse Harris. And we’re here Ed in Apalachicola and we’re speaking about black history in the Apalachicola African-American history pop up museum is one of the focuses here. It’s been my pleasure. Thank you so much for taking this time with me.

 

Jessie Harris [00:38:45] We work on.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:38:47] Yes, you did. Thank you so much.

Uncategorized

adminAugust 24, 2021

Ann Johnson

Madelyn McClarey [00:00:01] And since. Hello, my name is Madelyn McClarey, I am here in Apalachicola today, February 15, 20, 20, and I am here on behalf of Florida A&M University History History Department for Graduate Studies.

 

Ann Johnson [00:00:22] I’m here with Ann Johnson.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:00:25] And Johnson is indeed a native of Apalachicola, which is a very beautiful place here in Florida. I’m just interviewing her today to talk about some of the things that she found incredible about her beautiful society and community and what her contributions were and are currently so mischance as well. Could you tell us a little bit about what it was like growing up here in Apalachicola?

 

Ann Johnson [00:00:59] Well, I grew up here on Seventh Street in Apalachicola, and this is the school I attended for eight years. And what’s the name of the school? A family.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:01:12] That is amazing.

 

Ann Johnson [00:01:14] So with the Carolinas nuns. And and that’s where my first eight years. And by the time I got in high school, they closed it out. So I attended my last four years public school. Quinn High School.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:01:33] Awesome. And what was that transition like for you leaving this school and going?

 

Ann Johnson [00:01:40] Well, when I left the school here, we was a lot of bands than I was when I got out to the high school. There are a lot of the stuff that we had learned here. We were a little above them when I got there.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:01:58] That’s nice. And so do you feel like you were a leader when you got over there? Did you feel more confident? Right. Tell me about how you felt as you’re

 

Ann Johnson [00:02:10] here going to cap the school. We learned a lot more, you know, and and it was instilled in me because I was a little slow when I went to high school because, you know, kids tend to kid you, you know, because of where I came from.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:02:28] So when you say slow, you’re talking about like you weren’t really into a lot of the activities

 

Ann Johnson [00:02:34] they know, like, you know, and a lot of things that I say with a little a little more faster than I was. I understand, because we were you know, we was taught a lot more in skills, how to love one another and respect one another.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:02:50] That’s really amazing. And I feel like a lot of people in inner cities don’t have the experience that you had. And I write beautiful, just so you know. Tell me a little bit about do you have siblings?

 

Ann Johnson [00:03:06] Yes, I have five. Please. I have two boys and three girls.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:03:14] And what about sisters and brothers?

 

Ann Johnson [00:03:15] I have one sister, Lorraine Bank, the one you just met.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:03:19] Wonderful. What was it like growing up with her here?

 

Ann Johnson [00:03:23] Well, I will always take care of my sister. I’m the oldest. I’m two years older than you and she can always look up to me. And I was always a brother around the house and I learned how to cook when I was nine years ago.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:03:45] And so, I mean, from meeting you today, I see that you are extremely independent, you’re very intelligent, and you seem like a lot of fun. I just hang out.

 

Ann Johnson [00:03:59] I’m a people person. I love people always.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:04:03] So that being said, as a kid in Apalachicola, what were some of the things that you learned about your environment?

 

Ann Johnson [00:04:11] Well, Seven Street, which is right over here we are we call this the Cross Street, because that’s where the Huntress came up. We had our grocery stores and it was a real popular street is along with the school located Yield Seventh Street. And really, I miss to come because you used to be a huge car, but we did not live there. And we had our grocery stores and we got along really well with each other and we learn from each other. I’m a student. This is a popular street because we had the Rose family to have the Rose family had the barber shop, the poolroom. And also we had our. There it was real nice and we got along really fine. We learn from each other. We had one of my big families that we are close to was the Kelly family, which was really related to the speech, which was our principal at high speeds. And then we had our brochure, which was the road we had. We had Mr. Tomaro was one of our grocery stores, and he had us on a rough road, which was he was a builder. He built homes and still a great builder, construction. He was in construction and the Methodist church that that’s right. Now it’s the oldest church here and that’s the church we was raised in also.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:06:05] That’s what I was going to ask. So it seems like the community here was extremely close and that like you guys to be here today. Actually, I feel so much like broderie love among the people here as a person coming in. I immediately felt welcome in like a warmness about this community. Tell me about people who maybe pass through your community. Did you feel like it was like nice getting to know other people, but that your home was special? How did you feel about visitors coming through?

 

Ann Johnson [00:06:52] Well, like I say, I’ve always been a people person and I didn’t care about meeting people, you know, as my mom and my dad used to say. And they were bad because you communicate with both the blacks and the like. And I just reached out to people because, like I say, I love I love the people. And, you know, when I look at the kids today, I think they’re missing out on a lot. I’m not against technology, but some of the things that we learned growing up in our culture, I think kids should know more about it. We just sit down and be on the phone all day long and play games. Our data, we are going being really great musician Demchuk Mom, climb trees. I used to roller skate right up here on the sidewalk. I used to roller skate and we learned a lot from each other.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:07:57] I agree with you so much in that aspect because I can tell that, you know, again, this is a very close knit community that you’re always happy to see each other. I see people who are coming into town like we are today, and everyone that they’re kind of passing by is like, hey, wait a minute, like, you know, speak to me, say hello or whatever. And I think it’s so beautiful. It’s really hard to explain how nice it feels to be here. So when you were talking about the different relationships that you had with people across the lines of race, tell me a little bit about that. How did you feel, you know, growing up in Apalachicola as a black a black student, how is that going to school?

 

Ann Johnson [00:08:45] Well, when I went to school, we were integrated here. We will live in segregation. And but my kids, they got to go to school with me. And I got along I got along with everybody I don’t know anything about say, I got into big fights, arguments with anybody. I was just I did love the people. I would go out and visit the people I used to my first ti that I drink. Well, the rehab was really, really hard on me. And I told myself I always been social because I used to be there all the people. And the first day I think, look, I’ll the about it was and it was she invited me into a home right next to the road to room right up there of the corner seven straight. Right. Well anyway, she invited me in and she invited me to some place. It really was like a route me.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:09:58] This is the Searcy and.

 

Ann Johnson [00:10:04] Anyway, it was like a little room and bought the water and she placed it into hot water and we had what you call junk cookies in the cookie jar. And if you do need to get any cookies, anything I enjoy and I always went around in the community and I would always say I’m masturbating. My mom used to go through the community looking for because I know she got my baby miracle everything. She learned how to walk. Can’t you see?

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:10:45] What do you think? I’m laughing because I kind of grew up like that. I was always on three. What do you think? Because you’re talking about how you were very social and moving about in the community. What do you think it was about the community that just kind of kept you on the move? I know that a lot of times people think that like small towns, there’s nothing to do. Tell me,

 

Ann Johnson [00:11:11] what are you studying? I was a fisherman years ago. It was a guy named. What was his name when you say he owned a boat and he used to take us up on the river like a little houseboat. Wow. And you are he would talk a bit and you had sodas and snack fish and we would go up the Apalachicola River and fish. And his name was Mr. Donatello. And later on he became the key. I wanted to take care of it.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:11:53] So who’s an entrepreneur?

 

Ann Johnson [00:11:55] How would you leave the job with? My grandmother used to take us on a trip. Like I say, we go up the river and fish and we just enjoy the whole day and I’m still the fish. I could be everything. Really. That’s amazing. I told my kids I know in Korea and one of the biggest, they had lived here surrounded by all the water. Not going to believe I couldn’t swim, but I used to fall at the bottom of the boat. But I get out of the water. I always get back in the boat.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:12:37] And I was like, you trust the land, right?

 

Ann Johnson [00:12:42] We was always short. We kind of like shot people in our family. And she made my first fishing pole and I always followed my grandmother a lot. And what was really made me sick and you never saw merit name, but a maiden name was Mamie Madame.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:13:07] And tell us about her

 

Ann Johnson [00:13:10] where she was the most. She was short. She was very friendly in all the key. And all my kids loved her. And my oldest son grew up with her to a certain degree. And but I always enjoyed going fishing because she took a lot of time after which teacher. And I looked it up better when my sister was kind of like she was kind of like laid back and I was always the one out

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:13:46] having the feeling. Right. I think that is wow, this is so beautiful. I, for one, am one on this journey. And when I look at your face telling me this is. Oh, I can just see all the emotions and you being able to just like really channel that to moment

 

Ann Johnson [00:14:05] that you were in, and I think that’s where we used to have a grocery store called Little White Grocery Store. There was a white family with their last name was white. And I guess the right now because they like to smoke, despite driving to the store every morning, he always kind of never lived in a hurry. He was kind of slow about getting to the idea of digital. Come on, how are you going to open the store and get something out of the store? He goes down there taking about ten minutes or 15 minutes. The lady I knew was getting to the store, but and he used to own houses right down the street because when we was growing up, my mom used to rent one of these houses and his daughter, her name was it looked like she was in the music. And I love the piano. I love piano music. And she used to really play the piano. And another name are always this way. Anyway, she had a chair, a sister, and she had two brothers, Stanley and Laura with my middle name is also Laura. Oh. And I learned a lot from them. Yeah. Because of gave kind of education kind of highlight in education. And now and then she would go down to that school with Mississippi, with her granddad’s stuff and, and she was teaching me how to do some things in a store I never get. I would go through some ice cream and I’d I mean I the of that ice cream cone with I feel the difference with the laugh you say, but you don’t really have to fill it up like that at all. I didn’t know, you know, and when I am, I always saw my mother to go up there and every time he would go in the grocery store she would pick him up. And Apple, he will perhaps he won’t bite. I’ll pull it out of all the paper. And we ate. And one of his workers was the name of the delivery boy. Anyway, he wound up being it takes cake to also get a Coke. And he used to work in a store and we would come out of Sunday school on Sundays. You know, we go there with our little pianist and he would say, make up the band, make a man with color. I said, well, I want to read one. I want a green one. You say, what’s the difference? They all are the same, isn’t they? Will Mr. James Baker. Well, yes. The name of Cynthia Baker and his wife was a schoolteacher. She taught school.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:17:22] Yeah. So everything you really had great relationships with educators. I keep saying that we’re going back to, you know, how wonderful this was growing up here was, but how you always had a really strong relationship with people in the education sector. Right.

 

Ann Johnson [00:17:44] And I don’t know if you heard of the Humphris, they got they got a name at the bottom. It was it was Bob Hope. They my name is Minehan and it was a press conference and. Oh, my. With him right away. I never get we all attended Catholic school also dealing with a loved one in the line pay. Well we all attended here Catholic school and we all do. Yes. Is you know we went to a lot of us got it. You know, got into education Apalachicola. But then it was the college which I say was related to speech, which I like. I say we speak with the principal of in high school, high school in Utah and graduated from and I knew we had a home economics teacher with the name Miss McCaskill’s. And and then we had it Tolowa. She told my mom to call my mom, Miss Campbell was wanted to hold a teacher, she taught my mom as my mom attended a school called Dumba. OK, yeah, so.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:19:18] So what do you think that because I do see that you have such an outgoing demeanor, you’re so like poised and you’re talking about things that, oh, I can only dream about. Oh, I see that, first of all, on this type of work that you end up doing, like what was the most important thing for you here? For you?

 

Ann Johnson [00:19:46] Yes. When I was working well at school that day doing it, it was gonna move in with Simple. And Apalachicola was known as a seafood city. So I worked a lot in seafood. I tried to show borscht also which clam and well, later on it was my oldest daughter. She took eel and I from it.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:20:21] OK, OK. Can you tell me a little bit about your experience with the seafood industry? How did that feel? Did you enjoy that?

 

Ann Johnson [00:20:34] Well, to a certain degree. But I also used to work in a cafe. I was a cook. I used to love to cook, but I did seafood cooking. I used to work at the hook. Hook was one of a number one restaurants, all the nanny there and also worked with the Amazons. They owned a big OK. So is this a

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:20:59] family or a company?

 

Ann Johnson [00:21:02] It’s a company, OK. And it was a family because I work. Ah, she was my white friends. One of my white friends were very close, always were older than she was, and she always looked kind of like I was kind of like a mother to her daddy, like a mentor. And so as both the work that I did here work as well when they first came out of that, she needs to be certified. I went through to see the program out of Tallahassee back in 1979. I came certified as a it’s amazing. And I also worked at the hospital in care of a floor closed down for a long time. I worked in the nursery for I don’t do a lot. They really didn’t. Have they ever seen a certificate that time? And I worked all over the hospital and I always like nurse. I always like that. You’re amazing. I always got involved with that. I worked at one of the nursing homes that were here and they closed it down. Do you know the name of that? Maybe it’ll come to you. But it was right where Lowes used to be. And I like buy the hospital and I don’t see it until I know. Like I said, I wound up moving away, but ah, I’ve been going over forty some years

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:22:43] and that’s what I was going to ask you to. What encouraged you to come back.

 

Ann Johnson [00:22:47] Well, I come to see my mother, my mother are having some problems with her hair and like I say, she’s not supposed to be ninety five this year so I came back to relieve my sister. OK you’re

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:23:03] ok and you’re like the perfect person to do

 

Ann Johnson [00:23:06] it because. Yeah, because I’m used to seeing you on television, like, amazing. And before I came here, I live in Stockler almost thirty years and I worked there at one of the nursing homes there but thirty three years.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:23:29] So you truly are an educator, a nurse, a counselor, all of those really important things like that. Yeah, I

 

Ann Johnson [00:23:39] got my first job when I left high school. I went to New York and that’s where my first job I guess was working in the big day. Wow.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:23:53] Talk to me a little bit about. The only Apalachicola has changed because I know to be able to see some place, you know, as a child to grow up there and know kind of where everyone’s home is, every businesses, and then to see, you know, the changing geography. How does that make you feel like how I know that you’re back home

 

Ann Johnson [00:24:22] so you’re not here to stay. I’ll be leaving back out on the end of the month. Yeah.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:24:29] And but tell me how how you felt like when you came back, because you know the same place. Fortunately for you, a lot of the people are still here. So, you

 

Ann Johnson [00:24:40] know, two years of this city, the city of Apalachicola, all always depended on seafood. But the seafood, our industry had gone down. So, like I used to be known as one of the options capital. But it’s also you are buying it in one of the geography of that area. It’s going to be asked to. But a lot of it has kind of really played out. And I’m a little disgusted by some things. You know, it’s not like it should be growing like it really kind of to me.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:25:28] How does that make you feel? I know you said that you’re disgusted, but like to, you know, actually being here and not like, see it on TV or somebody tell you over the phone, like, what type of feeling do you feel besides that? I mean, knowing that you’re a native of this place, you know, home, no matter where else you live, this is where it’s like. Right. Tell me about some things you would change.

 

Ann Johnson [00:25:58] I don’t know if I’d be changing, but I would just love to see them change, you know, different styles in the coming year. Beside, you have to go way to Panama City, Tallahassee, Florida, hundreds of miles even with doctors at the hospital. I would love to see the hospital group. And it just some simple changes. You know, if they’re not even in a Wal-Mart coming here, you know, and it just. Just like me, that’s one reason why I say, even though this is my home, I wouldn’t want to come back to LA, not at my age of 77, simply because you have the everything if you really need. You got to go hundreds of miles to rise. Even if you need to go to a doctor or a specialist or something, you got to go hundreds of miles there and back it. If I don’t know what to be driving a night I was

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:27:11] driving is also, you know, that really calls to mind where we are in history. Right. So when you spoke of Apalachicola as a girl, right. You kept saying, like, we have one, we need it. Like everything, everybody. It’s kind of, you know, took care of each other out for each other. I hear you reiterate that. So that really says I’m right about not being in the age of technology like we are now. Right. But you’ve still had you feel like more resources than you have today.

 

Ann Johnson [00:27:49] You know, we do. We do. We shake shakes our meal used to run, but my grandma used to run. I mean, used to work. It shakes me. Where does a lot of these even places that I used to work at it with the seafood, they are closed down, they’re going down and it’s just like everybody just dying. I mean, I know it’s a lot of tears is coming here, but it’s the same old growth because we used to have this airport. We used to have soldiers coming in by boat, used to come in here so. Well, that brought a lot of interest in here. You know, people could work right there for that deal. Right. But there’s a lot of things have changed and nothing really, really to me. And it just I don’t know, it’s just totally different.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:28:56] It just feels different. Let me ask you a couple more questions and then I will let you take your leave. This is, like, incredible. Oh, like, I feel deeply honored, like, really. And I wasn’t even aware that I was sitting in your school like that. Yeah, we were in this one.

 

Ann Johnson [00:29:21] Oh, just right here. The church part is and is where we used to have our plays and stuff right here. And I wondered about that. I was like, oh, you have all the way we treat. And one thing I tell people always taught by God in prayer, oh, we prayed for five times a day a more positive. Well, what a difference. A kid in the Catholic school. Right. And I used to shine the candlesticks. I used to say,

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:29:57] when I can’t grow,

 

Ann Johnson [00:29:59] I’m never I never. But I got to Polish Ohio. I didn’t know Candlestick grave. I will not find it.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:30:08] They embrace it reminds me of my mother in irony. She’s like, I don’t want to.

 

Ann Johnson [00:30:15] So it was because you like your rules like this said that the three used to dress up so they will come out and go and say made because we used to sing in that year and we saw a lot of our rEU was in Latin. So we go, oh,

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:30:40] so you were being treated bilingually, you were being trained in a bilingual manner. Oh, that’s incredible. And that’s important.

 

Ann Johnson [00:30:50] Yeah, we had used it, we were taught a lot. Yeah. Yeah.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:30:54] I can I could sense that when you were talking about so you really felt like you’re, you’re a you know, you’re very like when I

 

Ann Johnson [00:31:05] was right, when I was when I was growing up, the priest asked me er would you want to be when you grow up. I said there’ll be a non Catholic nun.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:31:14] That means you were having a great time. Yeah. So. Oh and again, like I, you know, I thought we would be talking for ten minutes but you really are such a wealth of knowledge, you have such a wealth of knowledge, you’re a walking history for people to, you know, take a few minutes with.

 

Ann Johnson [00:31:37] It’s my first my first black movie I saw was I his name was Simpson, what we always call emergencies. The place up there, they call it the two spot. It’s been there for issues of the tiger. Well, anyway, he used to have show movies there. In my first movie I saw there was movies that, you know, people like talking. You would go see a movie die or you want power. But he had a lot he had a big line here. You get a lot of the Army people and National Guard. Hello. OK, like a long story. No, at his library. Get pricing a library, OK? He had a lot.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:32:30] So he actually claims, you know, enclosing a

 

Ann Johnson [00:32:33] unit that he had to say, I mean,

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:32:37] uniforms and all. That’s amazing. Tell me I’m going to ask you three questions. I mean, I feel like to be here all day, but I know that have to because this is so easy. Like your you you know exactly what important things are that you want to, you know, and capture them, remember? And there’s some people I don’t even know if I could be this,

 

Ann Johnson [00:33:05] you know me all about them.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:33:06] But I’ll tell you one of your favorite childhood memories here in memory of Jesus,

 

Ann Johnson [00:33:20] I’ll say planting flowers and cooking. I used to play any kind of seed I would buy. I never forget. One day my dad bought a bag of Steve there. Well, I went outside and I planted it. I didn’t realize it was cotton three. Oh, so. And we still watch how we used to call the bank and I we play. Right. I only get caught in the water in Kenya and I planted enough. I watched a plant growing old zone and then one day I noticed the birds start cracking open and whatnot. And my mom made a platter, a little small peel out of it.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:34:11] I grew cotton. What was their reaction when they realized it was gut?

 

Ann Johnson [00:34:16] And my reaction, I was really shocked about it because I used to love Bob and I love the game. Even when I live in the as we call the project at the street, I would go plant flowers in your backyard and stuff. I just love flowers and I still do.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:34:39] That’s amazing. You would watch them bloom.

 

Ann Johnson [00:34:42] I love flowers and I’m always curious about animals. My animal love of do not live snake. Oh yeah, I understand.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:34:54] That’s beautiful. That is a really beautiful challenge. Now what about and I’m going to I’m going to show forever because it really

 

Ann Johnson [00:35:06] sounds really interesting. Yeah.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:35:08] OK, so you plan it kind of on purpose.

 

Ann Johnson [00:35:13] All right. I didn’t know if it was a seed

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:35:18] without me because you played it right now. That’s my little. OK, so when you’ve got to run this pool and going to high school. Right. Tell me what type of transition and what kind of change you thought you might through. You know, wait a little bit nervous.

 

Ann Johnson [00:35:40] When I first attended high school, I did one of my biggest problem. Well, first, I had to learn hard not to say yes, yes, yes, father, because I had it was instilled in me and I had to learn, you know, totally different. It was totally different. Right. And but it was it was OK. But then, like, it was just something that was missing to me. Well, from what I had learned here.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:36:19] Right. Because you were here for a minute. Yeah.

 

Ann Johnson [00:36:21] And to go to high school. But it was like I said, I always love people. I like to get along with everybody. So and so. It was the. The atmosphere is totally different, of course.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:36:41] And I know that your outlook or demeanor, the way you are, is what really makes me awesome there to even.

 

Ann Johnson [00:36:51] Yeah, I wouldn’t call her. I used to love it and got the baby sitting up by her desk because I love to talk all. We like to talk and and I would

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:37:09] say so my last question would be. Oh yeah. Well OK. Yes. Is there any and I think I know the answer, but is there anywhere else you would have wanted to go

 

Ann Johnson [00:37:30] besides at my wedding? Well, I don’t think so, because like I say, everybody was close knit. I grew up with a lot of my relatives and I’ve been at all my relatives room. And just like the day you are there, I’ve been hugging most people because I know you can always mingle with people. And I don’t think I ever would have grown up during that time. Like I say, we all know each other well. You know, we we would like to say we were close knit if we can everybody down, please.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:38:24] So that’s really a special recipe, isn’t it?

 

Ann Johnson [00:38:29] And, you know, this year, Apalachicola meets the town of British people. Really?

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:38:37] You know what? I did not look that up. And I thank you so much for letting me bring you people. That’s wonderful. And I’m here to see that that’s true.

 

Ann Johnson [00:38:48] OK, and I think if I’m not mistaken, you came from the Apache. Yes. Indian.

 

Madelyn McClarey [00:38:57] Oh, thank you so much. This is wonderful. I love we talked for thirty nine minutes. It seems like it was ten because it’s just you’re really I keep saying you have a wealth of information on this. There’s no hesitation because you know, you’ve lived it and you know what your you want to talk about in which way the conversation needs to go. What’s important to you. And I just I can’t thank you enough because I feel completely honored to be in your company again. So my name is Madeline McClary. I’m signing off right now, February fifteen, twenty, twenty. And I’m talking to again. And it’s been my pleasure, Miss Johnson. Thank you. Thank you.

Apalachicola Hills

adminJuly 17, 2021

Arnold Tolliver

Arnold Tolliver [00:00:03] My name is Arnold Tolliver, T-O-L-L-I-V-E-R, born Arnold Robert Garrette, G-A-R-R-E-T-T-E. My grandmother’s name was Willie Mae Garrette. My mother’s name was also Ocille Wynn Garrette. I was born in Apalachicola, Florida December 17, 1947, raised by my mother, which we always called Ocie May and then I was raised by my grandmother Mae Garrette. We always called mama. Anyways, Nona Rose and Chester Rose was about paternal, not paternal. But anyway, they raised me and brought me up to life in a working attitude. I went to Holy Family Catholic School, then on to a Quinn High, which I want to stay one year while I was transferred to Lafayette, Louisiana in Holy Rose Institute.  I’m the oldest of nine sibilings I had the one brothers pass away, Vann Wynn.  I was raised here in Apalachicola, and I always have worked all my life doing things I wanted to do, as I wanted to do them, until those strict attitudes came in on me.  Anyway, I left there with the Holy Rose Institute in Lafayette, Louisiana, I graduated from there as a, “Most Likely To Succeed.”  And there I went on to join the United States Marine Corps, which a graduate out of boot camp with the a stripe as a private first class.  From there I went to Vietnam, twice on the U.S.S. Long Beach nuclear power crusier ship. There, I came back to Apalachicola, married Rose Tolliver then married my wife Billy Jean, and then now I’m married again. Anyways, I have had a good life in Apalachicola. Apalachicola has been a very, very gracious town, matter of fact, I’ve ate dinners and we had good times with the Dr. Fred Humphries, Ramona Humphries, Tim Humphries always, all raised here in Apalachicola together. And I have had a good successful life, my oldest sister (Camerts sp) has been a primary in my life. I don’t get along with none of them no way anyway. So that’s me.

Other Speaker [00:03:17] Tell them about the Marine Corps.

Arnold Tolliver [00:03:18] I told him about the Marine Corps. I went to the Marine Corps and I had a good successful life with that in the Marine Corps and I love the Marine Corps, or I came back to Apalachicola made Apalachicola my home, and there’s always going to be my home and that’s me.

Interviewer [00:03:38] Thank you so much.