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John B.: And so I was waiting at the bottom of the steps until the
superintendent come down, until he gets to the ____[??] to talk to me. And
while I was there, this foreman came by there. He told me, he said, What
are you doing? I said, I with the superintendent, but he left, went on off
to the office. The assistant superintendent told me where superintendent
was at up there. But I didn't tell the assistant superintendent my
business. I just come on out. Stand in line. And while I was there, this
foreman went over to the office, and he and assistant superintendent got
together somehow. I don't know what he said, but assistant superintendent
come on up there to me and I was still standing there and the
superintendent still on top of that platform there. And he said to me, Go
down there on that job and stay there until I move you. He said they would
have placed me around somehow if I hadn't, you know, acted up. So I'm
saying, no, I couldn't say that they give us, you know, different rights.
But whenever they could get away with it, they did it. But they didn't want
something open like that to come up. Get out of that because anything.
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Peter Gottlieb: Were Blacks segregated in the mill in different
departments?
Gottlieb: Um, in other words, you would always be working with other white
men. But usually the white men would have the better jobs.
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John B.: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't say that any department that was all
Black, but we could get so far as jobs was concerned, you know, we couldn't
get some jobs. Thought it was. Just couldn't do that. You was Black, you
couldn't have that job. That is before the unions. You know, bad enough
now. Even after unions, but before the unions terrible. You just didn't get
the job.
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John B.: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Always. And then such thing as a foreman. Really
foreman. So no, he drove me away. As I said-- anytime, little foreman, like
I go, seven men on scrap. Not work, wasn't working on there. But I said
working over men, you understand what I mean. But not because they're--
group better.
