Rosenbaum, Art

Description

Part two of a four-part recording. Art Rosenbaum interviews Doc Barnes in Athens, Georgia. Barnes talks about games he played as a child, such as shoot marble. When he was young, parents were strict with their children, and wouldn't allow them to date or get married until they were 21. Teenagers did not socialize except at Sunday school. He speaks about the relationship between white landowners and African-American sharecroppers, and says that if you lived on a white man's property and you were big enough to plow a field, you would plow rather than attend school. If the weather precluded farming, then you could go to school instead of work. The white farm owner, rather than parents, would dictate if you attended school or worked. Barnes attended school until the second grade. If you were a good worker, farm owners would prevent you from leaving. His father was traded to Lexington, Georgia, as payment for an outstanding gambling bet, and their current landowner in Athens retrieved him. Chain gains existed in Athens, and they were worked on by people who committed very minor offenses. There were not many white men on the chain gain. The guards would whip the men with a wet strap that had been covered in sand. One gang worked on Boulevard Ave. in Athens, in the rock quarries, breaking up rocks with sledgehammers. Barnes describes a man who worked on a gang on Thomas St. getting shot because he talked back to the boss. Barnes describes...

Record Contributed By

Walter J. Brown Media Archives and Peabody Awards Collection

Record Harvested From

Digital Library of Georgia