I have fourteen chillun.  Four boys are livin’ and two girls.  All are married.  George, my oldest boy graduated from grade school and de next boy.  I have 24 grandchillun and one great grandson.  John, my son is sickly and not able to work and my daughter, Mamie has nine chillun to support.  Her husband doesn’t have steady work.

The grandchillun are doin’ pretty well.

I think Abraham Lincoln was a fine man.  It was put in his mind to free de colored people.  Booker T. Washington was alright.

Henry Logan, a colored man that lives near Bridgeport, Ohio is a great man.  He is a deacon in de Mt.  Zion Baptist church.  He is a plasterer and liked by de colored and white people.

I think it wuz a fine thing that slavery was finished.  I don’t have a thing more than my chillun and dey are all poor. (A grandchild nearby said, “We are as poor as church mice".) My chillun are my best friends and dey love me.

I first joined church at Upperville, Virginny.  I was buried under de water.  I feel dat everybody should have religion.  Dey get on better in dis life, and not only in dis life but in de life to cum.

My overseer wuz just a plain man.  He wasn’t hard.  I worked for him since the surrender and since I been a man.  I was down home bout six yares ago and met de overseer’s son and he took me and my wife around in his automobile.

My wife died de ninth of last October (1936).  I buried her in Week’s cemetery, near Bridgeport, Ohio.  We have a family burial lot there.  Dat where I want to be buried, if I die around here.

Description of GEORGE JACKSON [TR:  original “Word Picture” struck out]

George Jackson is about 5 feet 6 inches tall and weighs 145 lbs.  He has not done any manual labor for the past two years.  He attends church regularly at the Mt.  Zion Baptist church.  As he only attended school about four months his reading is limited.  His vision and hearing is fair and he takes a walk everyday.  He does not smoke, chew or drink intoxicating beverages.

His wife, Malina died October 9, 1936 and was buried at Bridgeport, Ohio.  He lives with his daughter-in-law whose husband forks for a junk dealer.  The four room house that they rent for $20 per month is in a bad state of repairs and is in the midst of one of the poorest sections of Steubenville.

WPA in Ohio
Federal Writers’ Project
Written by Bishop & Isleman
Edited by Albert I. Dugen [TR:  also reported as Dugan]

Ex-Slaves
Jefferson County, District #2

PERRY SID JEMISON [TR:  also reported as Jamison]
Ex-Slave, 79 years

(Perry Sid Jemison lives with his married daughter and some of his grand-children at 422 South Sixth Street, Steubenville, O.)

“I wuz borned in Perry County, Alabama!  De way I remember my age is, I was 37 years when I wuz married and dat wuz 42 years ago the 12th day of last May.  I hed all dis down on papers, but I hab been stayin’ in different places de last six years and lost my papers and some heavy insurance in jumpin’ round from place to place.