Delta Jewels

by Alysia Burton Steele

  Mrs. Floyd is waiting for me at the front door. “Hello, Lisa.”

  “Hello, Mrs. Floyd.”

  We end up talking for more than three hours. She has more than a couple of stories; she tells me eight. When I tell her I will have a hard time picking several for the book, she tells me to run them all. I jokingly tell her the book isn’t about her and she replies, “Well, it should be.”

  I’ve chosen her remarks on unwed mothers testifying in church, going back into the cotton fields with her younger son to pay her older son’s college tuition, and her baptism experience.

  I tell these girls now, “You throwing your life away. Babies having babies.”

  Because [in the past] reverends, pastors would have you stand up in church and testify and beg the church for a pardon for having a baby out of wedlock. You had to get up and do that. But I tell you one thing, didn’t no lot of girls have no babies out of wedlock. If you had a baby before you were married, you had to get up in church and beg for forgiveness. I don’t remember too many girls having babies. It was just a different thing than what it is now. More respect, I guess.

  I thought it was good Rev. Parsons did it. I must have been about 15 or 16 years old. It inspired me. I remember two girls getting up and begging for a pardon. They were forgiven but Rev. Parsons told them not to do it again. I thought it was good, ’cause it scared the rest of them. Momma always say, “Keep your dress down and your drawers up.”

  One summer, Jerome and I had to chop cotton, in order for Tracy [her son] to go to Coahoma Junior College. There was one summer, one chemistry course he wanted to take, and I didn’t have the money to pay, so we had to go to the field. This was in 1983 and it paid $30 a day a person, and that was a lot of money. It paid for the course, but I had a little more. I had a little somethin’ else on the side. I didn’t want all my whole saving to go, but we got enough money to send him through.

  Jerome was 14 and said, “Momma, I don’t want to do this. It’s too hot out here.” I said, “We got to do this.” We did it for about a week. Jerome helped me to put Tracy through that class. Tracy said he was sorry we had that I had to go out there and work for him, but I told him I didn’t mind it because I wanted him to be successful and it paid off. He’s now Dr. Tracy Mims. Sometimes I cry. Tracy said he appreciate it. Ain’t that touchin’?

  The day I was converted, it a Sunday afternoon, two o’clock. It was the greatest experience my soul ever had. A sunshiny day. [She sings:] “Give me that old-time religion, give me that old-time religion, give me that old-time religion, it’s good enough for me.” I was about 8 or 9 years old in about 1948 and I was baptized in a white gown with a white bandanna ’round my head. And I remember Rev. Parson today. When he did his command and put my head under water and brought me up, then the sisters would sing, “Father, I stretch my hands to thee, no other help I know. If thou withdraw thyself from me, oh wherever shall I go.”

  Those were some good days. It was a beautiful time, people shouting on the riverbank. You know every time one go down, another come up, they would shout. They would baptize in a bayou.

  Now they got a little pool in the churches, but I was baptized in a riverbank on Egypt Road. It was this one Sunday and it was a gorgeous experience. It had, you know, snakes and frogs, but you know God didn’t let ’em bite us. [She sings:] “Give me that old-time religion, give me that old-time religion, give me that old-time religion, it’s good enough for me.” I can hear them sing that now.

  I joined our all-black Presbyterian church in Harrisburg when I was 12. Our church was small and conservative. My cousins and I made up most of the children activities.

  I felt so grown up. I had to do classes and ask questions of the pastor to join. Much different than what the Jewels describe in their bayou baptism experiences, but I remember being so proud when I got my own red Bible with my name engraved on it.

  And I cannot sing. It was embarrassing to be in the children’s choir knowing I couldn’t carry a note. (My singing was so bad that my aunt Marie would ask me not to sing in the car while she was driving. She found it distracting.) I used to mouth the words in the church choir. I wish I had a soulful voice like Mrs. Floyd.

  I love Mrs. Floyd and have a girl crush on her now, too. Our interview time was lovely. I often call one of the 54 church mothers to see how they are doing, but Mrs. Floyd called me after Mother’s Day 2014, a month after I’d last seen her. “Lisa, girl,” she said in her soulful singing voice, from her heart, deep from her gut, “I just saw myself on something called YouTube. I hollered the whole time. You are really doin’ something for us. Thank you.”

  Her words bring tears to my eyes.

  MRS. CORINE THOMAS, 94

  LAMBERT

  BORN ON DECEMBER 1920

  MARRIED 62 YEARS WHEN WIDOWED

  10 CHILDREN

  14 GRANDCHILDREN

  6 GREAT-GRANDS

  I was going to church to photograph two women in Lambert. The pastor, Rev. Reginald Griffin, had arranged for me to interview them after the 9:45 a.m. church service. Lambert was only 45 minutes from my house. I was relieved. I wouldn’t have to get up super early. It took a lot of gas to drive to the grandmothers and I didn’t have grants, and often I didn’t know where I’d find gas money. Sometimes I had to decide between buying fresh fruits and veggies or spending that money on gas. I always chose the interviews, my own private history lesson.

  It was a larger church compared to some of the others, and newer, too. The choir was large and their singing was beautiful. I pulled out my recorder to get some of the ambient sounds in church—the hum in the air.

  I didn’t know the two women, only their names. Every woman who walked into the church, I wondered, “Is that her?”

  Strangers said hi and I smiled brightly, happy to be there and even happier when I heard the choir sing. Hymns always make me cry.

  I am sitting alone near the back on the left side on the sanctuary, on a cushioned maroon pew, a hymnal in front of me, thank God. I grew up Presbyterian. I know our songs by heart. “Pass Me by Ole Gentle Savior, hear my humble cry…” But here in the Delta, I don’t know most of the old black hymns. I’m alone in the pew and thankful for a hymnal because I don’t know the songs and most churches don’t have books. They expect you to know the songs.

  At the end of service, Pastor Griffin approaches me. We shake hands and he introduces me to two women: Mrs. Thornton and Mrs. Thomas, best friends. Mrs. Thomas is very warm and welcoming. Mrs. Thornton looks me up and down and says hello, resisting the idea.

  The pastor’s office is large with two chairs and a sofa. Mrs. Thomas is wearing a brilliant all-hot-pink dress and coat. It’s stunning on her. Silk. Mrs. Thomas’s daughter is sitting in during the interview, along with the pastor, his wife, and the reticent Mrs. Thornton.

  I interview beautiful Corine Thomas first. She is pleasant and eager to talk. She’s in her nineties. When she gets excited about what she’s saying, she taps her feet and claps her hands. She is precious.

  “Do you remember the day you were converted, Mrs. Thomas?”

  “Oh yes. I remember,” she says. She perks up and gets excited. The foot tapping gets louder, along with her voice, and she talks faster. She claps her hands and rocks in her seat.

  To my right, Mrs. Thornton is rolling her eyes and mumbling, “We’re going to be here all day. She talks so much. You’ve started her now.” She doesn’t want to do the interview, but she’s humoring me because Pastor asked her to. I can hear Mrs. Thornton huffing.

  I was baptized in a bayou. When I got baptized, I didn’t make no mistakes. I was in prayin’, goin’ in the fields with tall cotton. I was layin’ on the field prayin’ for the Lord to hear me and give me religion. I prayed, and that Friday, the Lord heard me. When I got there, looked like I was goin’ on upstairs—just walkin’ up stairs. And when I walked out the church, when I got out, I looked, looked [like] the world had changed like gold. I just clapped my hands, runnin’, prayin�
�, thank the Lord. I was tellin’ ’em, I was tellin’ everybody, “I got religion!” Tellin’ it [now], I gets happy and I can’t help it.

  I stayed at home until I got 17 years old. My daddy died when he was 46 years old. After he died, I stayed by to help. It was hard on me when he died. I was his favorite child. I would help him saw wood and tote that wood in. He was proud of me. We would stack it up on the porch. Helped him until the boys got big enough to help him. When I was little, and was coming up, I had a big ole stomach and he called me Frog. I didn’t want him to call me that ’cause he called me that when boys come around and I didn’t want him to call me that.

  Mama and them said they won’t never let me go. When I was at home, I stayed at home. They said, “You won’t go nowhere but to church,” and “We gonna keep you at home. We not gonna let you marry. You gonna stay here.” That’s what they told me. They didn’t want me to leave them, they said, “ ’Cause you so good. You don’t do nothin’ but to stay here with us. You don’t go to those places…” And I didn’t wanna go. Boys was not likin’ me, well, I didn’t like ’em. I liked the boy that go to church. The boy I was likin’, his name was James, that’s what I like, and that’s the one that I married. He was a junior deacon in church. He was likin’ me, James Thomas. I was 15 when I was likin’ him. I was 18 years old [when I married him]. He was nice. And that was my husband. I was married to him for 62 years and we never separated, never did leave. I loved him ’cause he always laid the money on my lap. And he was always nice. He was like that ’til the day he died. We had all them children, and he was nice to all my children.

  “I was layin’ on the field prayin’ for the Lord to hear me and give me religion.”

  MS. IRENE THORNTON, 88

  LAMBERT

  BORN FEBRUARY 1927

  SINGLE

  1 CHILD

  When Mrs. Thomas’s interview is done, I say, “Mrs. Thornton, if you don’t want to do this interview, I understand. I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable.”

  Looking at the pastor, not at me, she says, “No, I’ll do it. Let’s just not take all day.”

  “I promise I won’t take much more of your time.”

  She shares two stories of her fighting in school, once when a teacher hit her sister for misspelling a word that her sister actually spelled correctly and once when a teacher tried to call her bluff for fighting. I jokingly say, “Mrs. Thornton, it appears you’re the fighter in the book. Those are the two stories I have for you. Is there anything else you’d like to share?” The pastor starts to laugh. He calls her Muhammad Ali.

  We all laugh. She smirks and she gets up to leave.

  “Wait, Mrs. Thornton. I have to take your photographs. Let’s do that in the sanctuary.”

  She huffs, and when the photos are over, I ask, “Mrs. Thornton, may I have your mailing address—just in case I need to send you a letter or card?”

  “No, you don’t need my address.”

  I don’t know what else to say.

  Mrs. Thomas says, “Irene, just give the girl your mailing address. It ain’t gonna hurt anybody. Stop being difficult.”

  My sister was goin’ to school and they asked her spell. So she spelled. They told her if she didn’t spell that word, then they were gonna whoop her. Her teacher was there. So she spelled every word. That teacher told her to hold her hand out and she was spankin’ her on her hand and I told my sister to take it [her hand] back. To all the children, I said, “We get up and go home. All of us.” And all of us went outdoors to go home. I led a revolt.

  All the teachers said if we didn’t come back in, they were gonna tell our parents. I said, “Well, we better go back.” I was about 10 years old. She spanked my sister and my sister spelled every word. I didn’t get along with that teacher ’cause she drank. One day she had a bag that she took to school and I asked her if she had a bag she wanted me to carry to school. She said yes, and I did. We walked fast and got in the school and opened the bag and inside was her whiskey. I didn’t have a good opinion of her at all.

  I was about 12 years old. I was fighting with a girl at school. She didn’t always bother me and she wasn’t a bully, but she hit me and I hit her back. The teacher told me, “Irene, you want to fight somebody, fight me. I’m big enough.” That’s what she said. We was outdoors and there were some bats out there and I grabbed a bat. I was gonna hit her. A boy behind me, he grabbed the bat to keep me from hitting her. Nothing happened after that. I got over it. I was easy to get along with as long as you didn’t bother me.

  MRS. MARY ELLA YOUNG, 93

  RULEVILLE

  BORN AUGUST 1921

  MARRIED TWICE; MARRIED 27 YEARS WHEN WIDOWED

  7 CHILDREN

  34 GRANDCHILDREN

  40 GREAT-GRANDS

  16 GREAT-GREAT-GRANDS

  Mrs. Young was also referred to me by Mrs. Hooper-White: “Lisa, I have a mother, but she lives in Memphis now with her family so they can help her. Will you consider her if she lives in Memphis?” I was happy to include her since she lived in the Delta most of her life—38 years in Drew—and was eager to talk.

  Mrs. Young lives just across the Mississippi line in Tennessee. Bobby drops me off at her house on a sunny Saturday afternoon and will pick me up in two hours; if it’s earlier, I’ll call him. “Please keep an eye for your phone,” I advise him as he leaves to run some errands.

  Mrs. Hooper-White tells me that Mrs. Young’s husband was the first black police officer in Drew (1967). When I ask her about him, she says he was killed in 1972.

  He was sick, said he was taken with a cold. He was off that week, being with the police he had vacation days. That Sunday, he said, “I’m goin’ back.” So he laid around all day. I said, “Why don’t you eat?” He said, “I ain’t got no appetite.” I fixed the plate, he just sittin’ there, pickin’ at the plate. I said, “You ain’t eatin’? You sick, you ought not to go back.” He said, “I ain’t sick, but I gotta funny feelin’.” He said, “I don’t feel right. I don’t know what it is.” So he laid down all that Sunday. He laid the uniform on the bed. He laid there ’til 5:30. He got up and got dressed. When he left the house, I got up and watched the car until he got out of sight. That night my sister came to the house and told me, “Mary, Lawyer just got shot.” I said, “Shot? What happened to him?” What happened that week [he was off], a black girl was married to a Mexican. The police took his license and everything. He drank a lot. [So that week Lawyer goes back,] the wife comes running to tell ’em he [her husband] was comin with the gun to kill the officer. She was tryin’ to stop him. She didn’t make it there before the Mexican did. So he had his pistol in his hand. The officer put the gun at the Mexican to shoot him. Lawyer jumped in the way and said, “Don’t kill him.” And the officer shot Lawyer, he was meanin’ to shoot the Mexican, but he shot my husband. I will never forget the day. I had cooked some chicken, dressing and greens, and a coconut cake. He loved coconut cake. It was my birthday. Every birthday I think of him. Every birthday.

  When Mrs. Young finishes this story, her family is crying. They are sitting behind me. It breaks my heart. “How do you handle your faith?” I ask.

  My mother would tell me you have to pray to get converted. My friend, she had joined the church. And I said, “Now, Willie Mae done joined church and I’m still a sinner. So I said I gonna pray. In the house, there was a chimney in the middle of the house. I would go in the closet and climb up behind the chimney and pray. So my two little sisters say, “Where she is?” Another would say, “I don’t know.” I was justa prayin’, “Lord, please free my soul.” My sister said, “I hear her, she’s somewhere, but I don’t know where she is.” So they lookin’. One say, “She in the closet.” I’d hush and be quiet. One yelled, “Mama said come here, she want you to do somethin’.” I wouldn’t say nothin’. She’d say, “I don’t know where she is.” So I come out the closet. We had chickens. Poppa done made a big ole coop for the chickens. So I went out there and I moved the coop. I said,
“They ain’t gonna find me out here. I raised it up and got under the coop. I was just a prayin’. They would look for me. I didn’t hear them comin’ and I was just a prayin’. Sister said, “Hush. Hush. I hear her.” I hushed. I kept quiet. So when I go back to prayin’, one say, “She under this coop. ’Cause, see there, she done moved it.” So they came in, found me under the coop.

  MRS. GLENNIE MAE HOUSTON, 96

  TILLATOBA

  BORN SEPTEMBER 1918

  MARRIED FOR 51 YEARS WHEN WIDOWED

  7 CHILDREN

  13 GRANDCHILDREN

  12 GREAT-GRANDS

  Mrs. Houston was at one time the only member of NAACP in her community and was its treasurer for more than 20 years. She is proud to have served as the grand marshal for the MLK Parade in January 2014. She is known for her chowchow recipe. When I show Mrs. Houston mockup pages of the book and read Ms. Tennie’s story about not being able to buy a Cadillac in her town, Mrs. Houston says, “Well, I have a story similar to hers.”

  In 1966 I worked evenings as a nurse’s assistant for an elderly woman who was sick. I worked 5 in the evening to 7 in the morning. I stayed all night. I had a room there. My husband was at home with the children. That was my first job. I stayed with her until she passed. They paid me $125 a week, which was big money at that time.

  In the mornings I would get a guy who drove taxis to bring me back home. I asked my husband, I said, “Let’s get a car, not a new car, just get a used one.” I said if I continued to work, I could pay the note.