Bessemer City, North Carolina

Ella is living in Bessemer City, North Carolina, when she becomes so desperate that she joins the union. She lives in a neighborhood inhabited mainly by blacks and works at a mill where blacks and whites are both employed. The town is smaller than Gastonia.

Stumptown

Stumptown is the name given to the neighborhood where Ella lives with her four children when she joins the union. Their house consists of two rooms, and most of her neighbors are black. The community is the epitome of the poor, rural neighborhood, and Lilly writes that she is surprised when she later discovers that blacks and whites do not intermingle in most places as had been her habit in Stumptown.

Gastonia, North Carolina

Claire is touring Gastonia, North Carolina with others from her college class when she meets Ella and other members of the union who are trying...