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Gilbert M.: Well, I just didn't like the attitude. I never had that much
dealing with it. Finally, when I was single, I meet a woman, a girl, by the
way you live, and she coming Virginia and North Carolina. I might have a
talk with her for a while, say excuse me. She from Mississippi? Of course.
She from Alabama? Of course [??].
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Peter Gottlieb: You, uh, you like women from your own state?
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Gilbert M.: Well, you get South Carolina women, and take women from nine
or nine [??]-- You take, uh, Nashville, Tennessee. In South Carolina,
women-- They act more kosher whenever. Very-- when when you find a female
from South Carolina and Nashville, Tennessee, that don't believe in
drinking and gambling, you can depend on her. Gottlieb: Uh huh. Gilbert M.:
You meet women who love to go to church, you can depend on her. Some of
them other ones, they would go to church and come right out of church and
go right home and get drunk. Then when you come home you, you're looking
for something to eat. If they feel it they might open a can of baked beans.
Type some jimbeau [??]. Tie a rag around they head and jump in the bed, say
I was sick all day. South Carolina women, they protect-- they don't do
that. They real. Far as I know. Now I could be wrong. I don't say-- they,
them on the street, they don't have good women. Gottlieb: Yeah. Gilbert M.:
But each to your own. Gottlieb: Right. Gilbert M.: But, like, if you go buy
a car, one man might come up and he want to buy a Ford. You look at it, you
say, I don't like it. I don't like that Ford. Next man comes up to buy a
Buick. Wouldn't come around. You say, Well, I believe I buy me this little
Volkswagen. Maybe 10 or 15. People say, I sure wouldn't have that. But
that's what you like. Gottlieb: Yeah. Gilbert M.: You go by your choice.
You-- when you pick and pick for yourself, nobody else s'posed to pick for
you, especially something that you got to deal with. When a man gotta work
and get tied, connected up with a female, if he got me in right, that's
life. That's a lifetime. Not get mad at them like-- 3 or 4 months. Once you
and the other are divorce, or fightin' and scratchin' all night. That's the
way I look at it.
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Gottlieb: There's something about your job I meant to ask you about and
forgot. Did your uncle help you find that job-- Gilbert M.: Nope. Gottlieb:
At Carrie Furnace? Gilbert M.: No. Gottlieb: Can you tell me about how
you--
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Gilbert M.: He told me when he got up to go to work that morning. We leave
the house 6:30 and he said. You want to work whiles you're here? How long?
I said, About a couple of weeks, I guess. And say, Well they hired
everybody that-- you can walk down that steps and said, If you want to
work. I had 1100 and some dollars. He don't know I got no money. So I got
to walk down there about 8:30 and I walk down to the wire mill. You want a
job? Yeah. Come on. About 8:30, and I worked at 3:00, and I was so dumb, I
was dumb. They put me on a tonnage job to start with in the wire mill.
Everybody come by. They put me wheeling nail from the guy, from the nailer
machine, galvanized machine, whatever-- That was tonnage. So everybody all,
everybody come by and say, what this job pay. Time keeper come by. He took
my time, I said, how much this job pay? The foreman come by, say How much
this job pay? So it was 3:00 when we quit. I come out, I said, Del, know--
I don't know no job. I don't know what I'm making. I got to learn a little
bit of brains. Gottlieb: Yeah. Gilbert M.: I know. I come out, 3 o'clock.
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Gilbert M.: They have a man out there, young man? It wasn't no US Steel,
it was Andrew Carnegie. Gottlieb: Yeah. Montomery: Anybody want a job with
Andrew Carnegie? $0.44 an hour. $4.40. Ten hours. But he told what would
pay, and I passed you. I said, Yeah, come on. I had to leave the wire mill.
Gottlieb: Uh huh. Gilbert M.: Be back to work. 7:00. I went back 7:00 like
a dummy and worked. 'Course I imagine that was a good deal I'd done to
myself, but I didn't know it. But finally, eventually the wire mill went
out of business and, you know, closed down. I wait about two days and went
back down to the wire mill, acting up on my time I quit. Said, We didn't
fire you after we competed. I quit now and I got paid, it'd be-- I got to
pay them paying off the money. $11.83. God. And I say, you told me I quit a
job for $11.83 for 8 hours and working for $4.40 for ten. But I will say I
was blessed. God would bless me all during the Depression time, I didn't
work, but I went out in the mill for 42 days, three time a day. And I
didn't get one minute work.
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Gottlieb: From-- from what years to what year?
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Gilbert M.: Back-- 1929 and 20-- and 30, 31, 32. Gottlieb: Mhm. Gilbert
M.: We didn't-- once in a while, uh, they'd have a breakdown on the
railroad, the foreman, he'd come by in the night. 2:00 and 3:00 o'clock in
the morning we got-- we got done, maybe take us an hour and fix what it. He
said well, we still up 7:00 in the morning. Well that would give-- Well, we
get paid for being there. Gottlieb: Yeah, right. Gilbert M.: But-- they
didn't-- I didn't draw the full pay-- The last full page I draw 1929 was
three days before Thanksgiving and I didn't draw another full pay until
April-- Sometime in April 1936, March the 17th, when the flood was, whether
you was born, I don't know. Gottlieb: No. Gilbert M.: Well, the flood was,
then everybody went back to work. But you had to work a month before you
get a pay. We-- I went back to work on the 17th of March. No, the 18th,
because the flood was March the 17th. And we went back-- We all went, they
called us back, come around and get us out the street. On the 18th. We
cried [??] Now we had to work a month, but we didn't get paid til April.
Everyone-- that was the first pay I got since 1929, in November.
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Gottlieb: Did-- did-- did you lose your job again when the mills went down
in 38? Gilbert M.: No, I never
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Gilbert M.: been laid off. They never, did the whole time. No, I never did
lose my check. Never. I never been laid off. The only thing was no work.
Gottlieb: Yeah. Gilbert M.: But you had to go out there three time a day
and report. I was just blessed. Gottlieb: Yeah.
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Gottlieb: How-- how were you able to stay alive and-- when you weren't
working?
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Gilbert M.: Oh, well, see, it was cheap. My second wife was living. I had
a little money. I was paying $15-- I was paying $15-- I was paying $15 a
month for three rooms and light and gas. And I never go to any soup line.
Well, I didn't go-- the kids go, they'd give them bread, but me and a
couple more friends, we used to roll out-- We're all out in the country. We
had a wagon and we all had a wagon-- pick up pop bottles and jars, any kind
of bottle. Gottlieb: Yeah. Gilbert M.: And bring them back in and sell 'em.
Gottlieb: And-- get some money, yeah. Gottlieb: And so you take the milk
bottle. A pint milk bottle was $0.02. A half pint milk bottle was a penny.
A quart was $0.03, a quart milk bottle was $0.03. You get a pickle bottle,
one of them big pickle bottle, that was $0.02. Sometimes, you can get out
there, you make a dollar. If you go out there and pick up enough-- had
scrap iron, anything, like-- you just would-- things. Gottlieb: Yeah.
Gilbert M.: Then we used to go out and catch the freight, go down to
Kennywood down there, catch the freight and steal the coal and unload it.
And we sell the coal two bushel for a quarter. Gottlieb: Yeah. Gilbert M.:
But long then-- center cut pork chop was $0.10 a pound.
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Gottlieb: I should have been alive back then. Gilbert M.: See what I mean?
Gottlieb: Yeah.
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Gilbert M.: Pig feet and pig ears or pig tails. You didn't buy it. You go
down the slaughter pen, they'd give it to you. Beef tripe. You go down
there and give it to you. You have to clean it yourself. Gottlieb: Yeah.
Gilbert M.: Hog chitlins. Now they take the liver off with that light. That
light, they'd give you that. Gottlieb: Yeah.
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Gottlieb: So you could do all right.
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Gilbert M.: You could take a dollar. You could take $2 then, you could
take $2 then, and go down right there on Eighth Avenue. You-- You could buy
a movie with $2, and you could go down there right today and buy it with
$20. Gottlieb: I believe it.
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Gottlieb: Mm. Do you ever look for any other kind of jobs?
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Gilbert M.: Was no place to look. Was no place to look.
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Gilbert M.: We'd go out in the country. We are-- we'd find pear trees,
peach tree, apple tree out-- Way out in the forest, course there ain't
nothing there now. 'Cause after the things opened up, a lot of people
bought that property and built homes. Gottlieb: Yeah. Gilbert M.: My wife
used to take peaches or apple, pear and can 'em with no sugar. Lotta people
say it won't keep with no sugar. It will. Gottlieb: Yeah. Gilbert M.: It
will.
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Gottlieb: When did you begin to go to services at Second Baptist Church?
How long had you been in Homestead before you--
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Gilbert M.: Long-- Ain't gonna lie, it's a long time.
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Gottlieb: And you hadn't--
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Gilbert M.: I didn't stop into church til after my wife-- after my second
wife died only just recently. 'Cause she used to go to church and take the
children. And I used to go after she died, go once in a while. And I didn't
start tellin' church-- 'cause me and her got married later and when she get
me out and she'd call me, ask, You come to church?, I said, Mhm, I'll be
there. I ain't gonna lie. Quicker she'd get dressed and go to church. I'd
just jump out and go find me a liquor train. [laughs] I tell the truth. But
I changed and started going to church during the last ten, ten, 12, 15
years. It might not be when-- I attend church with the offspring, attend
Sunday School. I ain't as bad as what I used to be. They always say a man
got to live his life out. Get stuff--
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Gottlieb: Had you, uh, when you were first living here in 1920, around
that time, had you ever been going to church at that time?
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Gilbert M.: 1920? Gottlieb: Yeah. Gilbert M.: No. No. I didn't have time.
I thought I'd missed something in the streets. 'Course I was-- belonged to
church from down South. Gottlieb: Yeah. Gilbert M.: Just like anybody
else.
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Gilbert M.: You can go--
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Gilbert M.: You make very after you let-- get away from home. Gottlieb:
Yeah, that's right. That's right.
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Gottlieb: Where-- when you were living up here and, you know, when you
began living up here in Rankin and over in here. Where did you meet the
people who became real good friends of yours? Did you meet them in at the
jobs you had mainly, or?
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Gilbert M.: Well, I meet people. Well, I guess my wife always tell me I
talk too much. I meet people and they speak French. But I don't make my--
myself stranger with nobody. Nobody, I don't make myself. I don't make
myself stranger with nobody.
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Gottlieb: So it would just be-- on the street--
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Gilbert M.: [simultaneous talking] I might just meet you on the street.
Say, how d'you do. And you say how d'you do. Maybe you might say, give me a
match and we might start a conversation. I said, Where you live and we
stand there and talk. Maybe-- Maybe somebody else will come by that knows
you or somebody come by and know me. And you just-- it just keeps
spreading. Gottlieb: Yeah. Gilbert M.: And maybe you would invite me to
stop by some time. I said, Well, you-- That's the only way you can make
friends. You can't make-- you can't make friends with people. I'll meet you
on the street and I see you, I look this way and you look the other way. I
don't know you, and you don't know me. Could be living next door.
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Gottlieb: Did any of your-- Did any of the people you work with get to be
good friends of yours? Gilbert M.: Yep.
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Gilbert M.: Got quite a few of them. Quite a few. Young and old. In fact,
to tell you the truth. Today I believe I have more young friends that work
with me. Than I have old ones because the most of the old ones died.
Gottlieb: Yeah. Gilbert M.: You hearin' this thing? And I get on Eighth
Avenue. I'm willing to bet-- if I and you was on Eighth Avenue. I doubt if
we'd pass ten white, female and male that don't know my name and call me,
stop.
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Gottlieb: Did you belong to any other kind of organizations besides the
church when you were up here? Like fraternal societies? Anything like that?
Masons?
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Gilbert M.: [simultaneous talking] Nope. I did belong to the Masons once,
I quit. That was years ago because it was the wrong one. I joined the wrong
one.
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Gottlieb: What do you mean by that? Gilbert M.: Huh? Gottlieb: What do you
mean by that? You joined the wrong one.
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Gilbert M.: Because to me, and I joined, when I lived in Rankin, is a
state rite.
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Gottlieb: I don't know very much about--
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Gilbert M.: Well, state rite? You could be one of the biggest officers in
the Mason, but you're not recognize no place but in the state where you at.
Gottlieb: Oh. Gilbert M.: But if you belong to Free and Accepted, you can
go to Europe and you were recognized.
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Gottlieb: Why did you join them back at that time?
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Gilbert M.: Well, it was a puzzle. John [??] called myself with a friend
of mine and he pulls up in State Rite after I got tied up I got find out
whose was it. I didn't know it till I went down South. When I went down
South and went and Latin and got kicked out 'cause-- Because a friend of
mine start askin' me, Do you know the password? And the password I told
him-- Gottlieb: It wasn't the right-- Gilbert M.: It wasn't his, it wasn't
theirs. And I couldn't go in and I quit. Because if you belong to the Free
Accepted that get me in-- that the world and if you got the password,
you're in Pennsylvania, you can go to Germany or France or anywhere. They
got the same password. But if you don't have it, you can't go in. Gottlieb:
Yeah. Gilbert M.: You just like a man they ain't never been blocked or
nothing. Gottlieb: Mhm.
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Gilbert M.: I-- Fact, I got Buffalo, and they had never got me off [??]
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Gottlieb: Hm. I've just about gotten to the end of the questions that I
had for you. If you think-- Gilbert M.: Thank you. Gottlieb: If you think--
if you think I've left anything out that.
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Gilbert M.: No, you ain't even done that. I think you finished. [laughs]
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Gottlieb: Okay. Well, thank you very much.
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Gilbert M.: You're welcome.
