BUDDY PEELER

TRANSCRIPT %u2013 BUDDY PEELER
[Compiled November 18th, 2010]

Interviewee: BUDDY PEELER

Interviewer: Carter Sickels

Interview Date: August 7th, 2010

Location: Near Boiling Springs, North Carolina

Length: Approximately 43 minutes

PART ONE
CARTER SICKELS: Okay, so my name is Carter Sickels. I%u2019m interviewing Buddy Peeler. It%u2019s August 7th, 2010, and we%u2019re at his house, so just say your name%u2026
BUDDY PEELER: %u2026My name is Buddy Peeler%u2026
CS: %u2026and when you were born and where.
BP: January the 4th, 1944, and I was born in Cherokee County.
CS: You were born in Cherokee County?
BP: And we moved in North Carolina when I was about seven.
CS: Okay.
BP: Which was right across the line.
CS: I see, okay. Where were your parents born?
BP: Both of them were born in Cherokee County, around Gaffney.
CS: Do you know why you moved?
BP: Yeah, Daddy bought a place up here.
CS: So did you all have a farm?
BP: Yeah, we farmed cotton and corn and wheat and stuff like that.
CS: And animals and--?
BP: Oh, yeah, we had cows and horses and pigs and chickens.
CS: Probably ate most of what you raised?
BP: Yeah, we did.
CS: Yeah. Do you have brothers and sisters?
BP: I had three brothers and four sisters.
CS: And where did you fall in the line?
BP: I was the sixth one, the seventh one. No, wait a minute. I was the--yeah, I was the sixth one.
CS: Okay.
BP: There%u2019s two younger than me.
CS: Okay.
BP: Started off with a girl and a boy, and a girl and a boy, and a girl and a boy, and a girl and a boy.
CS: Yeah.
BP: Mama took a lot of pride in that.
CS: That%u2019s kind of neat, yep. So I%u2019m guessing that you helped out on the farm a lot when you were a kid?
BP: Oh, yeah, we all did, yeah. Children started working on the farm when they was five year old, probably.
CS: What kind of things did you do when you were--?
BP: Well, we hoed cotton and picked cotton. You know, we wasn%u2019t tall enough then to pull corn, but when we got tall enough we pulled corn. We shucked corn for the cows, and we fed the animals. You know, we all had chores, big or little. That%u2019s just the way it was. We was raised no different than anybody else. Growing up, all my life I thought everybody had more than we did, but come to find out, we was the ones that had plenty to eat. There was some of them didn%u2019t have plenty to eat. We didn%u2019t have the bicycles and go-karts and nice cars like some of them had, but we always had plenty to eat. We was took care of well in that department. Daddy worked in the mill and farmed too. He%u2019d come home from work and work in the field %u2018til dark every night until we quit.
CS: What mill did he work at?
BP: He worked at Limestone. One of them was Limestone Mill in Gaffney, and one of them was called Dairy Dammits.
CS: Say that again.
BP: Dairy Dammits
CS: Dairy Dammits?
BP: Dairy Dammits
CS:Dairy
BP: Dairy Dammits. That was the name of it.
CS: So he farmed and then he was at the mill at the same time?
BP: Yeah, see, he%u2019d go to work at six o%u2019clock in the morning; he%u2019d be home by two-thirty every day. Get off at two, and he%u2019d be home about two-thirty every day.
CS: Still.
BP: And then he%u2019d stay in the field with us %u2018til six o%u2019clock that night. You know, in the summertime. We really didn%u2019t work from daylight %u2018til dark, but we%u2019d work from six %u2018til six.
CS: That%u2019s a long time.
BP: We%u2019d hoe cotton from six o%u2019clock in the morning %u2018til six at night.
CS: That%u2019s a long time. What did your father do at the mill?
BP: He was a loom fixer. He rode to work with a man that was the boss man, and I was jealous of that because this man was the boss man. I asked my daddy, I said, %u201CDaddy, how come you%u2019re not no boss man?%u201D and he said, %u201CSon, I make more money than that boss man does.%u201D I was small when he told me that, but he said, %u201CI make more money than the boss man does.%u201D
CS: How long did he work there?
BP: Well, he retired from there.
CS: So he was there a good while.
BP: Yeah, years. I don%u2019t know how long.
CS: When did you start working in the textiles?
BP: Probably in about 1961, %u201961, around there.
CS: What did you do before that?
BP: Well, I was born in %u201944.
CS: Okay, so you were just out of school.
BP: Yeah, school, and I went to work when I was about, I guess, sixteen, seventeen. I went to work at Cherokee Finishing, doing hand printing, and I didn%u2019t last long at that job. My daddy made me quit. I was working the third shift. I weighed a hundred-and-eighty-nine pounds when I went to work there, and ten months later I was a hundred-and-forty pounds.
CS: Really? What was the work like?
BP: It was just hard work. It was printing, with hand printing, and it would kill you. There was people from the lower part down below Gaffney that never had done nothing but haul pulpwood. They%u2019d come to work there and it%u2019d be so hard on them, they%u2019d quit and go back to hauling pulpwood. It was that hard. I mean, the work and the third shift too liked to kill me. I mean, it was hard. Of course, I was still living at home. I got up one day after the third shift, after I had slept, and Mama said Daddy come through there with tears in his eyes and said, %u201CTell that boy not to go back to that job.%u201D You know, I lived at home and what my daddy said do, you done it. I said, %u201CMama, I owe him for a car.%u201D She said, %u201CHe knows that.%u201D I said, %u201CBut I%u2019ve got to go back to my job.%u201D She said, %u201CYour daddy said for you not to go back down there.%u201D I had lost so much weight. Daddy, he told Mama that he come through there and my leg was out from under the cover, and he said he could see the bones in my leg. He said it looked like a razorback hog, with a bone sticking up. And I absolutely--I knowed I couldn%u2019t go back, and I didn%u2019t go back down there. I went and got my check later on, and, you know, that%u2019s just the way it was. We was raised to do what our mama and daddy said, and even at seventeen year old, I had to do what he said as long as I lived at home.
CS: So then what did you do next after that?
BP: I went to work over at Magnolia Finishing Plant. I stayed over there about five year. I was a supervisor after I was there about a year, and I stayed over there about five years, %u2018til about 1968, I believe it was. I went to work for my brother. I was working rotating shifts and he offered me a first-shift job, making straight money and actually making more money even though I was working for Deering-Milliken, and it was right here at home. I was driving fifteen miles one way, so I took that job and I stayed with him for thirty-five year.
CS: What was the name of your brother%u2019s company?
BP: Peeler Rug Company.
CS: How did he get it started?
BP: He bought a loom. You know, everybody used to--a lot of people had looms in a little ol%u2019 shed somewhere, and they made rugs. Well, he bought one and he bought another one and he bought another one, and then he bought two more, and he kept on %u2018til he had about a hundred. He kept building buildings, and he bought a print machine, and then in 1972 we bought a screen printer, a precision-made screen printer. It printed towels. Then we bought another one and we got hooked up with Cannon Mills, and then we bought another one, and we wound up with eight of them. They was as long as from here to--oh, they was probably three times as long as my house.
CS: Oh, really?
BP: Yeah. We wound up running eight of them. We%u2019d print a trailer load a day. Sometimes it was three trailer loads a day for Cannon Mill. That was back before the NAFTA thing was signed. I heard it on the news, as a lot of people did, one night. My brother, Bob, come down to my office the next morning, and we was talking about it. I was telling him what I%u2019d heard on the news, and I told him, I said, %u201CBob, it will put us out of business.%u201D
CS: You knew, then.
BP: I thought well, we%u2019ll do good to last a year. I mean, I was so afraid. I thought well, maybe we%u2019ll last a year. But nine year later that%u2019s what put us out of business. We couldn%u2019t compete with what was going on overseas and in Mexico. There was no way that we could compete with them. I was selling seat covers to K-Mart, and there was a company who had a company that started a plant overseas that kept cutting the price on me. They%u2019d come to me, and I%u2019d have to cut to keep the business there another--you know, trying to get signed up for another year. And the buyer--there was a new buyer, by the way--and he was playing me against him, playing us against each other, trying to get the lowest price. I was getting $16.50 for seat covers, and I had wound up cutting to $14.25. When the other company cut again, I told the buyer, %u201CI can%u2019t go no lower.%u201D We had never been late on a shipment. Now, I was shipping to individual stores every day, a trailer load every day.
CS: Okay.
BP: You know, boxed up, which would amount to about two thousand seat covers a day. Anyway, this new buyer started buying them from this other company. Well, six months later, they was two months behind. They couldn%u2019t keep up. I had never been late with a shipment, and he called me and wanted me to come back in with a price. His name was Chad Smith, and I told him, %u201CChad, I won%u2019t be there. I%u2019m not coming with another price.%u201D Their office was in Michigan. I used to have to go every year. I said, %u201CI won%u2019t be there.%u201D I said, %u201CChad, you%u2019ve got the price. I can%u2019t do nothing with it. You%u2019re just not important to anybody any more.%u201D Me and the buyer before him was real good friends. I mean, he was a good man. He had told me one time the worst thing a buyer could do was buy stuff too cheap. He%u2019d come down and just talk to you like anybody and be good to you. Back years ago--I%u2019ve been quit smoking twelve years--but I was at a show in Chicago at the McCormick Place, and this buyer that I thought so much of was a little ol%u2019 short, fat man. Well, he smoked. He come to my booth, and he just took his briefcase and slid it like a bowling ball, and all these people was watching him, and at that time, K-Mart was a lot bigger than Wal-Mart. Everybody was watching--Jack Funk was his name--they was watching Jack, you know. Well, he walked up and slid that thing across the carpet and grabbed me with his left hand, holding me and jerking me into him, just bouncing me off of him, and all the time reaching in my pocket to get a cigarette. There was some of them that would have--that would have really thrilled. But I had got to know him real good, and he%u2019d come down to the plant a lot from Michigan, and joke and just--and love to go out and eat. He loved a good salad, but he was just somebody you could be comfortable around. I was always more at ease around him than I was some of the other buyers that I dealt with, like some of the mail-order companies and stuff like that. We shipped to a lot of--well, most of the major mail-order companies, I shipped seat covers, drop-shipped for them. Are you familiar with Sportsman%u2019s Guide and Gander Mountain and Cabela%u2019s? J.C. Whitney? I%u2019m going to name one you%u2019ve probably never heard tell of: Mule Creek. Mule Creek was a spin-off of Sportsman%u2019s Guide.
CS: Okay.
BP: There was some more of them; I can%u2019t think of the name of them, but I shipped to all the major mail-order companies.
CS: What all did you manufacture?
BP: Seat covers, and I manufactured some tire covers. But we was making seat covers when we shut down for anything. When I started making seat covers in 1980, I started the plant for my brother, Bob. We started making seat covers in 1980. We made three different seat covers. We made bucket seats, mini-trucks, and a regular truck. I can%u2019t tell you how many we made. They started changing the styles of the seat, but at that time there was only three styles. I could make a bucket seat to fit the car seats, the truck bucket seats, or the mini-truck. You know, it got complicated, but we kept up with it. When new vehicles would come out, we%u2019d find one and make it match.
CS: How many employees did you all have?
BP: In the whole company, the printing, the rug company--there was a rug company in Blacksburg and the company right down here--we had, I believe, five-hundred-fifty-four at one time.
CS: Wow, okay.
BP: That was back in the eighties when everything was booming. Money was beginning to flow then, not like it was back in the sixties and like it is now.
CS: So the eighties was a good time for your company?
BP: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, the eighties and the early nineties, and it began to happen in the nineties.
CS: Because that%u2019s when NAFTA was--?
BP: I think it was, what, about %u201992, wasn%u2019t it?
CS: I%u2019d say, yeah, %u201992 or %u201993, maybe.
BP: Somewhere around in there. I%u2019d say, yeah, but my brother, about the time we had got to where we was losing money, we was making upholstery material, like on these chairs here, and we couldn%u2019t make it for the cost of what they could buy it for in Mexico. We offered a big buyer that was had dealt with a lot, we offered him a close-out on some several thousand yards, but we was going to let him have it at a dollar a yard. He laughed and said, %u201CI can buy it in Mexico cheaper than that.%u201D So, we was just squeezed out.
CS: Right, and so you were doing well up until that point?
BP: Yeah, and we done good after that, but it was going downhill.
CS: How soon after NAFTA passed could you start feeling it?
BP: It was probably within six months.
CS: Was it?
BP: We began to realize that things wasn%u2019t going to be the same. Maybe six months to a year, somewhere along there, and it started going downhill from there on. You know, you%u2019d lose this customer, and you%u2019d lose another customer. I had a customer that I was shipping in bulk to, I was shipping seat covers to. He was putting them in his display box and shipping them to another company. They was going to Advance Auto, but he had the sales for them, and he was buying them from me. I%u2019d put them in a big box, just pack them in a big box, and he%u2019d take them out. I had to fold them a certain way, and he%u2019d take them out of that box and put them in a display box, and then he was packing them six to a carton and sending them. He had always told me if he didn%u2019t--I was selling him about 25, $30,000 worth a week--he had always told me if he didn%u2019t fax me an order on Monday to call him on Tuesday. Well, I started calling him on Tuesday and he wouldn%u2019t answer and I couldn%u2019t get ahold of him. At the end of the week, I told the secretary, %u201CI don%u2019t know what%u2019s going on, but y%u2019all don%u2019t have to hide him from me,%u201D and he got on the phone and he said, %u201COh, I buy from Mexico now. I save lots of money.%u201D No, %u201CI buy it from overseas. I save lots of money,%u201D that%u2019s what he said. [Interruption] But you know, the textile business just gradually went away in about nine year, really.
CS: Yeah, and you were probably watching a lot of mills that had been here for a long time close down.
BP: Oh, yeah. I watched mills that had been here, companies that went down. I watched a lot of men lose their retirement. I knowed a lot of that, and it lost big money, money that would really make a difference in a lot of things.
CS: Yeah, a lot of people lost their jobs.
BP: Big companies just went busted and couldn%u2019t pay them, and there wasn%u2019t no stock, and some of this stuff, the stock went down because these companies went to Mexico and spent all their money to save the company, to save their company. And you know, we all had that choice, but how many people would have? I mean, we didn%u2019t do it, and that%u2019s what we%u2019d have had to have done is started a company over there, and we didn%u2019t want to do that.
CS: So when did you actually close then?
BP: 2001.
CS: 2001?
BP: We held on that long. We lost a lot of money too.
CS: Did you have to lay off employees before then?
BP: Oh, yeah. We had to go to cutting back and cutting back and cutting back, but it got to where the products that we was shipping, we couldn%u2019t make enough profit on it to pay everything, and we finally just realized that. After losing several million dollars, we had to shut it down.
CS: Wow.
BP: And a lot of other companies around here did the same. I mean companies that had been around for a lot of years, such as Gaffney Manufacturing and some of--. [Interruption--Mr. Peeler%u2019s wife, Molly, comes into the room] CS: How long have you lived out here?
BP: Forty-four year. Ain%u2019t that right, Molly?
MOLLY PEELER: You%u2019re asking the wrong one. I don%u2019t know.
BP: Forty-four year.
MP: Sheila%u2019s forty-three, isn%u2019t she?
BP: Yeah.
MP: Forty-four.
BP: It will be forty-five year in February, yeah.
CS: Okay. That%u2019s a long time.
BP: We moved here ten weeks after we got married--they finished our house. We rented a house. I paid three months rent, and we lived there ten weeks, two-and-a-half months, and moved in here. [Sound of running water] We got married December 22nd, and I paid the rent on about the fifteenth. Paid it for December and January and February, and we moved in here about the middle of February. The rent on the house was forty dollars a month.
CS: Forty dollars a month? [Laughter] That%u2019s pretty nice.
BP: Forty dollars a month.
CS: Can you just describe a little bit about how the area was just--what was different about it back in the seventies and eighties, before things started closing down?
BP: Well, it was easier to spend the money going out to eat then than it is now. My wife and me used to go down to a steak house that we knew the people that run it. Quincy%u2019s was the name of it, but we knew the man and woman that owned it and his mother, and every Wednesday night we%u2019d go down and get a salad. That was our way of dieting; we was cutting back. We%u2019d just eat a salad that night, and we got to be friends with them, and every Wednesday night they%u2019d, this man and wife and the manager would come and sit at our table. The manager smoked then, and I did too, then, and he%u2019d order us a cup of coffee and we%u2019d smoke a cigarette. And then the owner started coming, and then his wife started coming and sitting down. You know, me and Molly would be sitting here and here, and he%u2019d come sit down with me or Molly one, and a lot of times when Maxine, his wife, would come and sit down with the other woman, there would be the four of us. He%u2019d come and drag a chair up at the end, or his mama, Jenny, one. We had a good time and it was relaxing. Seemed like we had more time back then. You know, we don%u2019t feel like going as much now as we did back when we was younger. I%u2019m sure that will happen to you.
CS: I was wondering if the morale changed of the county and the area with that many people losing their jobs in the nineties.
BP: I think they found other jobs, but I don%u2019t think they do as good. I don%u2019t think they feel as good about things and they don%u2019t have the security. They realize now that there%u2019s not as much security. I didn%u2019t think we%u2019d ever shut the plants down. I thought we%u2019d be there from now on. I thought our grandchildren would be running these places one of these days. I just didn%u2019t know it could happen, and I%u2019m sure there%u2019s a lot of people felt the same way I did.
CS: Yeah, they expected their kids would work there, and their children, grandchildren.
BP: I didn%u2019t know the business would just go away the way it did.
CS: Do you think that the county is bouncing back, or that it%u2019s on its way, or do you think it%u2019s still a long time?
BP: I think it%u2019s a long time. There%u2019s no jobs.
CS: Yeah.
BP: I mean, where do you go to get a job now? The quality of jobs--I mean, there may be as many jobs, but they%u2019re more on the scale of Hardee%u2019s and McDonald%u2019s. And I realize there are a lot more of them, but if everybody%u2019s working at them, who%u2019s going to work and make the money, or are we just going to keep circulating that money?
CS: Yeah. Are more of the younger people leaving the area, do you think?
BP: Yeah, I think so.
CS: For work?
BP: Yeah, I think so.
CS: How many kids do you have?
BP: Two.
CS: Do they live here in the area?
BP: Both of them live down in Grassy Pond, which is six miles from here, right across the line, not far across the line. They both built on my mother-in-law%u2019s--. She passed away, and she had sixteen acres that she left. My wife%u2019s an only child and she got it, and they built. Of course, they built down there before then, but they built on that land. My daughter works for an orthodontist.
CS: Where does she work?
BP: The orthodontist, the dentist.
CS: Oh, the orthodontist.
BP: Puts braces on. Her husband is a welder, and he%u2019s got a good job. My son is self-employed, a carpenter.
CS: A carpenter?
BP: And he%u2019s got lots of business, does good.
CS: Did you work any more after you closed?
BP: No, not really, but I help my son some now. I had some bad health there for a couple or three year, and I really wasn%u2019t able to do much, but I started helping him part-time, and I help him out.
MP: He don%u2019t do nothing but just run up and down the road, mainly.
BP: Yeah, I run up and down the road with him. Run errands for him sometimes, and I don%u2019t do it full-time.
CS: Yeah, okay. Do you have anything else that you wanted to tell me? Anything I didn%u2019t ask? Anything to add to it?
BP: No, I%u2019ve enjoyed talking to you.
CS: I%u2019ve enjoyed it too, and it helped me.
BP: You think of things that you really hadn%u2019t give a whole lot of thought to in a long time.
CS: Any advice you have that you would give to pass on to the younger generations?
BP: Not from me, no.
CS: [Laughter] Well, you%u2019ve done all right, haven%u2019t you?
BP: I%u2019ve got nothing to complain about.
MP: We work a lot harder here than we ever did on the job, trust me.
BP: Yeah, we work here all the time. I%u2019m doing something all the time.
CS: Yeah.
BP: You know, I was thinking this morning, how in the world do people--? You see people just get out, and every time you see them they%u2019re clean and dry and not smelly and sweating. How come they don%u2019t never have no more to do than they have to do? I have to stay here all the time doing something all the time. Even these trees, when I built my house here, all these trees was young, and now they%u2019re all old and there%u2019s limbs falling off. In that wind storm the other day, I picked up a trailer load of limbs, me and my grandson. I had to pick them up before we could cut the grass, but I%u2019ve decided not to cut the grass. It had such a time in that dry spell, I%u2019m going to let it grow, maybe %u2018til next Monday.
CS: You seem like maybe you enjoy doing a lot of stuff, though.
BP: I do. I don%u2019t like for my%u2026
CS: %u2026Aren%u2019t you able to just sit around all the time?
BP: There ain%u2019t many weekends that my yard don%u2019t get a cutting. I may cut it yet. But I usually cut my grass on Friday or Saturday, one.
CS: It%u2019s nice out here.
BP: Yeah, it is.
CS: Well, this was good. I thank you for setting aside some time for me.
BP: Well, I enjoyed talking to you.
CS: I really enjoyed it too.
END OF PART ONE
Transcribed by Mike Hamrick, November 18th, 2010
PART TWO
CS: All right. So tell me about that.
BP: After I went to work for my brother, I was real interested in my job, as I was in any job I was on. And I bought me a loom and I started making %u2013 I was buying yarn for three cent a pound.
CS: How much would a loom cost?
BP: Oh %u2013 a hundred and fifty dollars.
CS: OK.
BP: And, of course, you had to have a winder, and a thing to make your bobbin, your fiddling with, a fiddling winder also. And it was what they called a %u201Crag rug.%u201D And I was buying it for %u2013 I was buying it, I was paying a nickel a pound for the yarn. Paying three cent a pound to get it put on spools, and I was making a rug that would weigh less than two pound. So I%u2019d have sixteen cent in it. And then I was paying a woman a nickel a rug to cull them, and sew them, and fold them, and have them ready to go. So, I%u2019d have about twenty-one cent in them. So, I would come home from work, and I%u2019d run my loom. When I first started, I%u2019d come home and run that loom till I made a hundred rugs, about a hundred rugs. And you know, I knowed I%u2019s gonna make me about forty dollars. And you know, that was good money, back in 1970. And then I got me another one, and then I changed and started making a thread rug, and then I started selling to a man over here at Shelby that was selling seat cover material. And then I was getting, you know, a little more money for them, and making a little better.
CS: Where did you sell the rugs?
BP: To a fella %u2013 they was several people that I sold the old rag rug to. But when I started making the thread rugs, I started selling them to a man over here in Polkville, Hayward Shuford. Hayward Shuford and %u2013 they was another one, fella that ran in the %u2013 Ed Shuford, Ed Shuford, but there was another man named Hayward Shuford over there that we sold to too, I sold to. And they %u2013 he resold them to make seat covers out of. And %u2013 so that%u2019s what I was doing when %u2013 you know, all at the same time, all of it just went out, all together. I mean -- and you know, I saved my %u2013 we didn%u2019t spend any money. We didn%u2019t make that good a money, but we made good enough that we %u2013 if we hadn%u2019t been out there making that little bit of money, we%u2019d a been somewhere spending money, so --
MP: Well, we paid our house off.
BP: We saved up that money to pay our house off early.
CS: How long did you do that for? When did you stop your %u2013
BP: Probably %u2013 what year did I stop, Molly? About 1995? Along in there, wasn%u2019t it?
MP: Now, is she talking about when you stopped your rug shop, or is she talking about with your rugs?
CS: Yeah.
BP: Stopped out here. It was about 1995 %u2013 %u201994 or %u201895.
MP: I didn%u2019t realize we done it that long, but it coulda been.
BP: Yeah, we did.
MP: I didn%u2019t realize it.
BP: We done it from about 1970
CS: Just getting harder to %u2013
BP: Yeah, it was harder to compete.
MP: But now, you was tired when you got home, and we had other things to do. And that%u2019s when you sat me down at the table, and you showed me if I%u2019d start running the looms during the day, I could make a hundred dollars a day.
BP: Yeah.
CS: And so you %u2013
BP: -- clear a hundred dollars a day.
MP: And that set me on fire! [laughter] And I went to it!
BP: And she quit her job and started staying here, and I had some girls that come in and helped her, and I showed her how we could, you know, at least clear a hundred dollars a day, after taxes and everything.
CS: That%u2019s nice.
BP: That don%u2019t sound like much now.
MP: But it was.
BP: That was a lot of money back then.
CS: Did you enjoy doing it?
MP: Yeah, I did. When we first started, when the looms was running good, but as we done it %u2013
BP: You didn%u2019t like it as much.
MP: No, it did get harder. Because sometimes the looms wouldn%u2019t run good, and I%u2019d be having to call Buddy, and he%u2019d have to run home, and try to get it %u2013 you know. And then he hired a loom fixer to help out, and I don%u2019t know if he was that much of a help, or a hindrance. [laughter] Cause he didn%u2019t know as much about looms as Buddy did.
CS: But you said it was somewhat common for people to have %u2013
BP: Oh yeah, they was a lot of people %u2013 my son was about, I guess he was about seven year old, and he%u2019d never knowed -- he knowed I made rugs. And he was talking about it with one of his friends one time, and he said %u201CWell, where does his daddy make rugs at?%u201D [laughter] He thought if we made rugs, everybody made rugs!
MP: But it was a way that I could stay at home, and be at home when the kids got off the bus. And then I%u2019d come in, and I could have my supper on, have supper ready. Buddy%u2019d come in and sit down to eat and go straight to another job. He done that for years--years. I mean, he used to be tough. [laughter] Y%u2019all take that part out!
BP: I still am.
CS: I guess that%u2019s sort of a lost %u2013 I don%u2019t know %u2013 lost art, or lost skill --
BP: A lot of people done that around here, you know, made rugs in their spare time, or they run a job, but they did that too. I knowed lots of them that done it, and lots of them made a business out of it, and quit their jobs, and done that all the time.
CS: See now, that is interesting, cause I%u2019ve only heard just about the big mills, you know --
MP: Well, that%u2019s what I was just fixing to say. I was standing here thinking, if you wanted to get really down in the nitty gritty, Bob was the one that was into textiles so big, you know, his brother.
BP: Well, that%u2019s who we%u2019ve been talking about.
MP: But that was in South Carolina, and they put this plant down here, and we ran North. But, you don%u2019t hear as much about the little ones as you do the big ones, do you? [laughs] CS: No, that%u2019s true. I think that%u2019s interesting.
MP: I tell you, she%u2019ll run out of tape if I sit here! [laughs and leaves] BP: And they was a lot of people, and you always enjoyed getting together with them. You always %u2013 and they helped each other. The yarn that you sold %u2013 you know, you%u2019d sell them some yarn, if you needed something, somebody needed something, they%u2019d come and get it from you, and they was a lot of that. And a lot of these people, most of them become good friends, and has a lot of respect for the others ones that was in the same business. I know I did. One of them over here at Boiling Springs -- Harvey Davis -- have you interviewed him? Did you know him?
CS: Huh-uh. I%u2019m writing him down.
BP: Well, you should. You won%u2019t meet a finer feller %u2013 he%u2019s almost as nice as me and Buzzy! [laughter] CS: Harvey Davis?
BP: Harvey Davis. But, he%u2019d quit his job, and just made a company out of it. And he was really smart, because as things changed and the rug business went bad, he converted to the thread rug, and he got hooked up with the people making the seat covers, so he could get a better price out of it. And then as that started dying, he began to get into knit stuff, and he%u2019s big into making book binding now.
CS: Oh is he? That%u2019s neat.
BP: He got into making cord, and then he got into making the book binding.
CS: That%u2019s pretty neat.
BP: And he is %u2013 he%u2019s really done good. His son, and his wife %u2013 he%u2019s turned it over to his son, but his son and wife worked right along with him %u2013 they got along good, you know, they wasn%u2019t no arguing or fussing. They%u2019s just real good people.
CS: Yeah. Well, it seems like there were a lot of family businesses and local people working for %u2013
BP: They are. They used to be a lot of that. They used to be a lot of it, and they was several little rug companies around here, and they would put them in a car shed. I mean, you know, they%u2019d have them in their basement. I knowed a man had looms in his basement. They was a lot of %u2013 they was a lot of people that worked out of their basement cutting these %u2013 people would make these rugs and take them to them on rolls, and they%u2019d have a setup to where they could cut them, and hem them, fold them, and tie them up ten to a bundle.
CS: OK. That was neat.
BP: And these people that did that made good money.
CS: Yeah.
BP: Even though it didn%u2019t cost %u2013 like I said, I was paying a woman a nickel a rug.
CS: Wow.
BP: I%u2019d have sixteen cent in my material. You know %u2013 I might have a little more than that, I%u2019d have filling in it. But I%u2019d have sixteen cent if they%u2019d a weighed two pounds, and most time they weighed about a pound and three-quarters. And this was a twenty-four inch rug, which you made them twenty-three and a half. And you cut them forty-five, and if they drawed up to forty-two, or forty-four, they still passed %u2013 as a 24 x 45. The labels that all of them put on them said %u201Capproximately 24 x 45.%u201D You never said %u201Cthis is 24 x 45%u2019 %u2013 approximately.
CS: Approximately. [laughs] BP: And so, you know, the rug would weigh %u2013 and the filling yarn that you put in it -- which was a little bitty string, and it would last forever. It was %u2013 most time it would cost you a quarter %u2013 twenty cent to a quarter a pound. But you didn%u2019t have %u2013 you%u2019d probably %u2013 even if you%u2019d counted it all, you counted it two pound, counted it eight cent a pound, you%u2019d a had sixteen cent in it. Plus your twenty-one cent in your hauling, and your work, you know. And we was getting sixty-five cent for them. And it finally went to seventy cent. And then I changed over to making the thread rugs. Which was %u2013 you know, you%u2019d get a dollar for that rug %u2013 same size. A dollar to a dollar and a nickel. And then I started making the wider ones, and getting two-fifty for them. That added up.
CS: Yeah, that is good. Good profit. OK. Finished now? [laughs] Thank you for coming --
END OF PART TWO
Transcribed by Deborah Rogers, May 15, 2011
Edited by Darlene Gravett, June 7, 2011
Sound quality good