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Legacies Project Oral History: Lomas Shaw

When: 2020

Lomas Shaw was born in 1915 in Laurens County, South Carolina. He attended Sterling High School in Greenville, SC, where he played football and baseball. He sang in a quartet at Friendship College in Rock Hill, South Carolina. After moving to Detroit in 1943, Shaw was a streetcar and bus driver for many years. He was married to his wife for over 70 years, and they had seven children. He was a dedicated member of Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church. He passed away on Saturday, February 18, 2017.

Lomas Shaw was interviewed in partnership with the Museum of African American History of Detroit and Y Arts Detroit in 2010 as part of the Legacies Project.

Transcript

  • [00:00:10.02] SPEAKER 1: So please say and spell your name.
  • [00:00:13.62] LOMAS SHAW: L-O-M-A-S S-H-A-W-- Lomas Shaw.
  • [00:00:20.74] SPEAKER 1: What's your birth date, including the year?
  • [00:00:23.20] LOMAS SHAW: December the 31st, 1915.
  • [00:00:29.79] SPEAKER 1: What's your religion?
  • [00:00:31.82] LOMAS SHAW: I'm a Baptist. I believe Jesus is the Son of God. I believe he died for my sins.
  • [00:00:39.86] I believe he got up out of that grave and he's alive today. And I was a sinner. I asked him to come into my heart and be my boss. And he came in, and change took place in my life. And I am a Christian.
  • [00:00:58.92] SPEAKER 1: What is the highest level of formal education you have completed? Did you attend any additional school or formal career training beyond that?
  • [00:01:07.92] LOMAS SHAW: I went to-- my highest education was seven years of college-- Friendship College in Rock Hill, South Carolina.
  • [00:01:20.87] SPEAKER 1: What's your marital status? Are you married or--
  • [00:01:26.90] LOMAS SHAW: Yes, I'm married. I've been married, as of last July the 31st, I was married 71 years.
  • [00:01:38.20] SPEAKER 1: OK. How many children do you have?
  • [00:01:41.42] LOMAS SHAW: I have seven.
  • [00:01:43.97] SPEAKER 1: How many siblings do you have?
  • [00:01:46.61] LOMAS SHAW: I have 12 siblings. All have deceased except me.
  • [00:01:55.40] SPEAKER 1: What was your primary occupation?
  • [00:01:59.27] LOMAS SHAW: My primary-- well, actually, I enjoy singing.
  • [00:02:04.46] SPEAKER 1: Oh.
  • [00:02:05.26] LOMAS SHAW: Mm-hm.
  • [00:02:07.31] SPEAKER 1: At what age did you retire?
  • [00:02:09.69] LOMAS SHAW: I retired at 69 years of age.
  • [00:02:16.43] SPEAKER 1: OK. So now we're going to start with family naming history. By that, we mean if there are any stories about your last name or like any traditions of naming in your family. So do you know any stories about your family name?
  • [00:02:39.82] LOMAS SHAW: Ah, not particularly. They're usually understood from my parents would pick the name from the Bible, or either someone that they were well-acquainted with and was doing good in life.
  • [00:03:03.11] SPEAKER 1: So about the family [INAUDIBLE], why did your ancestors leave to come to the United States, if you know anything about it?
  • [00:03:14.61] LOMAS SHAW: Well, I was born here in the United States.
  • [00:03:16.62] SPEAKER 1: Oh.
  • [00:03:17.79] LOMAS SHAW: I didn't have to come from another country.
  • [00:03:20.93] SPEAKER 1: OK. How did they make living in the United States here?
  • [00:03:28.31] LOMAS SHAW: Well, they have several ways of making a living. Some of them are school teachers. Some of them are preachers.
  • [00:03:37.55] Some of them are lawyers, doctors, whatever the case may be. It's all kind of ways that they can make a decent living. And the most important thing is going to school and learning a trade.
  • [00:03:56.76] SPEAKER 1: OK. Describe any family migration once they arrived in the United States and how they came to live in this area.
  • [00:04:08.94] LOMAS SHAW: Well, now, like I say, my whole family--
  • [00:04:12.10] SPEAKER 1: I mean migration in the United States from a different state, like--
  • [00:04:17.24] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, from state to state?
  • [00:04:19.13] SPEAKER 1: Yeah.
  • [00:04:19.61] LOMAS SHAW: Well, we was always-- my family came from Laurens County, South Carolina. And that's where my daddy came from. And then, of course, after he got married and children begin to be born, then we stayed right around that vicinity.
  • [00:04:50.74] SPEAKER 1: What stories have come down to you from your parents and grandparents or more distant ancestors?
  • [00:04:58.12] LOMAS SHAW: I didn't quite understand you.
  • [00:05:00.17] SPEAKER 1: What stories have come down to you by parents and grandparents?
  • [00:05:06.60] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, they was all honest people. Most of them were Christian. They wanted to do-- whatever they did, they wanted it to be right or godly done.
  • [00:05:20.99] They were fair. They were honest, and they taught us the same. They taught the siblings to be fair and be honest and above all accept Jesus as our personal savior.
  • [00:05:43.18] SPEAKER 1: So this completes the section of questions about your family history.
  • [00:05:49.14] LOMAS SHAW: Right.
  • [00:05:52.11] SPEAKER 1: So now we're going to talk about earliest memories and childhood. So this part of the interview is about your childhood up until you began attending school. Even if these questions jog memories about other times in your life, please only respond with memories from this earliest part of your life, if possible. Where did you grow up, and what are your strongest memories of that place?
  • [00:06:18.52] LOMAS SHAW: I grew up in Laurens County, South Carolina. That's where I went to school there. That's where I went to church. That's where I played baseball, which I liked to do, and football, right in that area. All of my childhood, meaningful, was taking place in that area.
  • [00:06:47.30] SPEAKER 1: How did your family come to live there?
  • [00:06:52.58] LOMAS SHAW: Well, I'm not too sure.
  • [00:06:56.71] SPEAKER 1: What was your house like?
  • [00:06:58.96] LOMAS SHAW: Well, it was just a bungalow. It had an upstairs and downstairs. And it was located near a stream of water. There were lakes and there were ponds. And it was right in the edge of a wooded place.
  • [00:07:29.27] SPEAKER 1: How many people lived in the house with you when you were growing up, and what was their relationship to you?
  • [00:07:35.80] LOMAS SHAW: OK, well, there were 12 siblings. And of course, you know, they all weren't born at the same time. Most, more or less, before it got too crowded, some of them had became grown men and women. And they had left, got married, whatever the case. So usually, it was six or seven there at the same time.
  • [00:08:04.58] SPEAKER 1: OK. What languages were spoken in or around your household?
  • [00:08:10.58] LOMAS SHAW: English.
  • [00:08:16.25] SPEAKER 1: What different languages-- were different languages spoken in different settings such as at home, in the neighborhood, or in local stores?
  • [00:08:25.97] LOMAS SHAW: More or less, it was all English. Our language was more or less English all around in that vicinity.
  • [00:08:33.10] SPEAKER 1: OK. So now family life-- what was your family like when you were a child?
  • [00:08:45.69] LOMAS SHAW: Say that-- repeat that again.
  • [00:08:47.49] SPEAKER 1: What was your family like when you were a child?
  • [00:08:51.91] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, they were the working peoples-- honest. They taught us, along with what they did, to be honest in dealing with everything that you dealt with. And they taught us to be honest also.
  • [00:09:09.57] SPEAKER 1: What sort of work did your father and mother do?
  • [00:09:13.38] LOMAS SHAW: Farm. All of them were farmers.
  • [00:09:19.05] SPEAKER 1: What is your earliest memory?
  • [00:09:23.46] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, I guess about-- I guess about 10 years old, probably.
  • [00:09:35.23] SPEAKER 1: Now about routine and special activities, what was a typical day like for you in your preschool years?
  • [00:09:43.62] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, enjoyable. My days were happy days, enjoyable days. I had a family that were closely knitted together, and that fell back on the children. We always enjoyed one another, the children did.
  • [00:10:04.34] SPEAKER 1: What did you do for fun?
  • [00:10:06.91] LOMAS SHAW: Play baseball, swimming, fishing, rabbit hunting, squirrel hunting, pheasant.
  • [00:10:21.16] SPEAKER 1: Did you have a favorite such as toys or a game, book, or books or other entertainment?
  • [00:10:31.00] LOMAS SHAW: Repeat that again.
  • [00:10:32.38] SPEAKER 1: Did you have a favorite, like a favorite toy, a favorite game, or like a favorite book?
  • [00:10:41.17] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah, I enjoy reading the Bible. That was my favorite. That was a daily thing.
  • [00:10:47.80] After I got a certain age, that was my daily thing. I read the Bible. And then before I go to bed at night, I prayed. When I got up in the morning, I pray
  • [00:11:04.57] SPEAKER 1: Were there any special days, events, or family traditions you remember from your early childhood years?
  • [00:11:11.34] LOMAS SHAW: Birthdays. Every child would have a birthday celebration. We celebrated Easter.
  • [00:11:18.15] That was the birth of Jesus Christ. Oh no, Christmas is the birth of Jesus Christ. We celebrate Christmas and the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, Easter, and those special days. Now each child's birthday were always a special thing in our family.
  • [00:11:42.80] SPEAKER 1: This ends part two of the interview. So now part three, the youth. So in this part of the interview, we will talk about your time as the young person about the age that kids usually start school in the United States up until you began your professional career or work life. So what do you remember about preschool?
  • [00:12:12.98] LOMAS SHAW: Repeat that again, please.
  • [00:12:14.31] SPEAKER 1: What do you remember about preschool? Or did you go to preschool?
  • [00:12:18.88] LOMAS SHAW: Well, preschool, we got that at home. Mama and dad always taught us before we was old enough to go to a public school. So we got the preschool teaching at home from my mother and my daddy. And then with my sisters and brothers, those that was older than me, they would help us too, of course. They was already in school.
  • [00:12:48.54] SPEAKER 1: What do you remember about elementary school?
  • [00:12:52.05] LOMAS SHAW: Well, elementary school was a one room school. And all the classes was in one room. And we have a certain time for every class to be taught. And we'd have us a lunch period at 12:00. Then we'd go back at 1:00, stay to about 5:00 PM.
  • [00:13:16.21] SPEAKER 1: So are there any special stories, like what you experienced in elementary school?
  • [00:13:23.04] LOMAS SHAW: Well, elementary school, I experienced-- you would have to-- if you study your lesson at night, the teacher would make an assignment for the next day. And that meant that you had to study at night.
  • [00:13:39.15] So when the next day came, then you prepared to solve the problem, whatever it might be, for that. She always makes special assignment. Now if you didn't get the assignment, you could be punished.
  • [00:13:54.93] Sometimes they have you standing up for 20 minutes near the wall or whatever the case may be. But if you didn't get your lesson, nah. You know, it all depends on the teacher. Some teachers were more strict than others. But more or less, you knew to get your lesson that night for the next day.
  • [00:14:20.98] SPEAKER 1: How was high school? Like, do you remember anything about it?
  • [00:14:25.44] LOMAS SHAW: Yes.
  • [00:14:26.22] SPEAKER 1: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [00:14:26.57] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, high school, when I went from grammar school to high school, it was higher. The lesson became more complicated. That met you had to put more time in studying than you did when you was in primary classes. And the teacher also was very strict that you would get your lesson for that next day.
  • [00:14:57.94] SPEAKER 1: So are there any stories or some things that you experience with your friends in high school or something like that?
  • [00:15:09.98] LOMAS SHAW: Well, I always liked to read Shakespeare. He was a great man in [INAUDIBLE]. You know, I always thought his stories were real, real good. They were so practical.
  • [00:15:26.91] SPEAKER 1: If you did not go to any of the clubs-- excuse me. So where did you go after high school? What do you remember about it?
  • [00:15:42.49] LOMAS SHAW: Where I went to school?
  • [00:15:43.88] SPEAKER 1: Yeah.
  • [00:15:44.55] LOMAS SHAW: I went to-- high school, I went to college.
  • [00:15:48.99] SPEAKER 1: College.
  • [00:15:49.47] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, I went to college after high school.
  • [00:15:51.59] SPEAKER 1: Do you remember anything about it?
  • [00:15:53.31] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, Rock Hill, South Carolina. Friendship College in Rock Hill, South Carolina. That's where I finished.
  • [00:15:58.71] SPEAKER 1: Yeah.
  • [00:15:59.73] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, Friendship College in Rock Hill, South Carolina. Two years of college-- they had only two years, at Friendship College. And that's where I went.
  • [00:16:10.79] SPEAKER 1: Did anything exciting there? What did you experience--
  • [00:16:15.55] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, I experienced--
  • [00:16:16.14] SPEAKER 1: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [00:16:17.28] LOMAS SHAW: Excuse me. Yeah, there, I sang with the college. I sang with the quartet, rather.
  • [00:16:28.16] And that's how I came to Detroit. That's how I got to Detroit because our quartet was invited to come to Detroit here and perform and to advertise our school. And we came here, and we performed here many on many occasion.
  • [00:16:52.02] And I said I probably would come here and live. So I went back home. And when I finished, I came here.
  • [00:17:03.01] And I've been here ever since. And that was 1939. I've been here ever since.
  • [00:17:15.49] SPEAKER 1: What was a typical day like for you in this time period of school?
  • [00:17:22.57] LOMAS SHAW: Repeat that again.
  • [00:17:23.74] SPEAKER 1: What was a typical day for you like in that time period?
  • [00:17:30.47] LOMAS SHAW: I have no comments about that.
  • [00:17:34.08] SPEAKER 1: So what did you used to do for fun in your youth? From the age 10 to like 18?
  • [00:17:41.41] LOMAS SHAW: OK. Well, I was an outdoor person. I liked to fish.
  • [00:17:49.37] I liked to rabbit hunt. I liked to ride the horses. I liked to play ball. And we did all of that while I was on the farm at the young age. I did that, those things.
  • [00:18:12.11] SPEAKER 1: So. please describe the popular music during your school years.
  • [00:18:22.98] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, we sing a lot of hymns. We sang a lot of spirituals. And we did saying anthem, spiritual hymns, anthems, and folk songs.
  • [00:18:42.48] And also, we have what we call shape note music. You get the tone by the shape and the place of the notes. And you sang those songs. That's some of the things that I did at that time.
  • [00:19:01.72] SPEAKER 1: And what was your favorite kind of music in your youth and your school years like? What did you like to listen to?
  • [00:19:08.90] LOMAS SHAW: Anthems. I came to like anthems very, very well.
  • [00:19:19.33] SPEAKER 1: Did the music have any special dances associated with it?
  • [00:19:24.26] LOMAS SHAW: No, no, I wasn't involved in the dancing at all.
  • [00:19:32.40] SPEAKER 1: What were the popular clothing or hairstyles of this?
  • [00:19:39.39] LOMAS SHAW: I didn't understand.
  • [00:19:40.79] SPEAKER 1: What were the popular clothing or hairstyles?
  • [00:19:44.30] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, the popular clothing was-- well, we didn't-- boys didn't start to wear long pants until they was 12 years old. They just wore short pants. And when they were 12 years and older, the boys starting what we call long pants. That was back in my days.
  • [00:20:16.92] SPEAKER 1: Were there any slang terms, phrases, or words used then that aren't in common use today?
  • [00:20:25.38] LOMAS SHAW: I have no comments.
  • [00:20:30.67] SPEAKER 1: Were there any special days, events, or family tradition you remember from this period?
  • [00:20:35.38] SPEAKER 2: And I read it.
  • [00:20:35.77] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah--
  • [00:20:36.70] SPEAKER 2: [INAUDIBLE] I read it. I read it on in, big brother. [INAUDIBLE] will be there. No doubt.
  • [00:20:44.23] SPEAKER 3: Some--
  • [00:20:44.72] SPEAKER 2: Get out of here, man.
  • [00:20:47.61] SPEAKER 3: --a truck or something. OK, it's gone now. I don't know what that was. That was really weird. Sorry about that.
  • [00:20:53.77] LOMAS SHAW: It's OK. That's all right. Now ask that question again.
  • [00:20:57.76] SPEAKER 1: Were there any special days, events, or family traditions you remember from this time?
  • [00:21:02.41] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah, we have picnics ever so often in the summertime. We'd have fishing parties. You go out there. Two or three people would go fishing, and the one that caught the most fish, they would be recognized as the champion.
  • [00:21:30.50] SPEAKER 1: Were any changes in your family life during your school years?
  • [00:21:35.90] LOMAS SHAW: Well, only changes that I can recall, some of them were getting older, and they were married. They got married. And they would have a family of their own.
  • [00:21:47.00] That meant they moved out from the home to their home. And they didn't stay young all the time. So they would move from one point to another.
  • [00:22:17.48] SPEAKER 1: Which holidays did your family celebrate or how are holidays celebrated in your family? Were there like, traditionally-- were there any traditions on special holidays?
  • [00:22:29.47] LOMAS SHAW: Well, 4th of July-- we celebrate 4th of July, that big summer day. We'd play baseball. We'd play-- sometimes we'd shoot horseshoes. Sometimes, we'd ride horses. That was the day that we really held in high esteem.
  • [00:22:50.39] SPEAKER 1: So were there any traditions? On Christmas, were there any traditions how you would celebrate it or on Easter or birthdays?
  • [00:22:59.18] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah, we always celebrate the birthday of Jesus Christ, Christmas Day, and Easter, his Resurrection day. We celebrated that.
  • [00:23:07.25] SPEAKER 1: Yeah.
  • [00:23:08.04] LOMAS SHAW: Those two days we definitely observed and celebrate.
  • [00:23:13.62] SPEAKER 1: So were there any special things happening? Like, special things--
  • [00:23:16.85] LOMAS SHAW: We'd go to church on Easter. I mean, Christmas we go to church and have service in church. Easter, we also go to church because that's the day that Jesus rose from the dead. We had that in high esteem.
  • [00:23:32.42] SPEAKER 1: Were there any special [INAUDIBLE] would it have been special in those days or like food? Was the food special on those days?
  • [00:23:42.62] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah, yeah. Oh yeah, mother would cook cakes for Christmas. When we wake up on that Christmas morning, we certainly would have cake.
  • [00:23:53.09] And then the daddy would-- you know, we call Santa Claus. Christmas Day, that's when the Children get their toys, their presents. Every child would get a present-- an apple, orange, candy, firecracker, like [INAUDIBLE]. That's Christmas Day. Yeah, that was the big day.
  • [00:24:21.18] SPEAKER 1: Were there any special recipes in your family, like a family recipe that you preserved and would give to generations?
  • [00:24:31.81] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, corn, fresh corn. Okra was our favorite, or pies, potatoes pie, potato custard. Those are special foods that we would have at all time-- you know, regularly. Uh-huh.
  • [00:25:03.42] SPEAKER 1: When thinking back on your school years, what important social or historical events were taking place at that time, and how did they personally affect you and your family?
  • [00:25:16.16] LOMAS SHAW: Repeat that.
  • [00:25:17.68] SPEAKER 1: When thinking back on your school years, what important social or historical events were taking place at that time or how did they personally affect you and your family?
  • [00:25:27.90] LOMAS SHAW: OK, when you graduated from college, that was a big thing. Your parents would be sure to come to school and be there during the celebration. And that was a habit time more or less.
  • [00:25:49.69] You'd get some kind of present. You done finish. You done made the mark.
  • [00:25:57.78] SPEAKER 1: In the world, like in the place where you live, in that area, were there any important historical events going on and did they affect your family? Like--
  • [00:26:11.93] LOMAS SHAW: No, not where-- I don't remember where I was. Yeah.
  • [00:26:17.43] SPEAKER 1: So this completes the section about your school years.
  • [00:26:21.18] LOMAS SHAW: OK.
  • [00:26:25.17] SPEAKER 1: So now we're going to talk about adulthood, marriage, and family life. So this set of questions covers a fairly large period of your life, from the time you completed your education, entered the labor force, or started the family until all of your children left home and you and your spouse retired from work. So we might be talking about a stretch of time spanning as much as four decades. After you finished high school, where did you live?
  • [00:26:59.57] LOMAS SHAW: After I finished high school, I stayed at home. That's where I began my college, there at home. I stayed at home.
  • [00:27:12.86] SPEAKER 1: Did you remain there, or did you move around? [INAUDIBLE] you working [INAUDIBLE], and what was the reasons for these moves?
  • [00:27:20.58] LOMAS SHAW: Didn't move. I stayed right with my family.
  • [00:27:32.43] SPEAKER 1: I'd like you to tell me about your marriage and family life. So tell me a little bit about your spouse.
  • [00:27:42.13] LOMAS SHAW: OK. When I married, I was 22 years old. That was 1939. My wife was 18 years old.
  • [00:28:00.35] SPEAKER 1: Where and when did you meet?
  • [00:28:03.24] LOMAS SHAW: We met in school-- Friendship Junior College in 1938. That's when we met.
  • [00:28:13.94] SPEAKER 1: Did it start out as being friends, then you started a relationship? Or did it-- were you friends before, or did you just start--
  • [00:28:25.38] LOMAS SHAW: We were just casual friends. And my wife was very smart. And I always found myself near her to help me out with something I didn't understand in school. And she would always help me out. And that friendship grew from the friendship to a wife.
  • [00:28:49.28] SPEAKER 1: Tell me about your engagement and wedding.
  • [00:28:54.11] LOMAS SHAW: Well, we got engaged when school was out. We got engaged. And we married at her house. We got married at her house.
  • [00:29:09.74] SPEAKER 1: So how was the engagement? Was it on a special occasion in a restaurant?
  • [00:29:14.51] LOMAS SHAW: No, it was not. It was no special occasion. It was on a Sunday. And I went from my city, [? Greenville, ?] South Carolina, over to Rock Hill, South Carolina, where I got married there at her house, in her house.
  • [00:29:32.72] SPEAKER 1: How was the wedding? Like, more details, like on what day it was, or what people came to your wedding [INAUDIBLE].
  • [00:29:45.65] LOMAS SHAW: It was only-- when we got married at that time, it was only the preacher, her sister, and myself because the other members of the family was going to church. Matter of fact, it was a secret marriage.
  • [00:30:05.39] You ever heard of a secret marriage? It was a secret marriage that nobody knew about. We just told two or three people that we were going to get married. And we kept it secret for a long time.
  • [00:30:21.38] SPEAKER 1: Tell me about your children and what life looked like when they were young and living in the house.
  • [00:30:26.43] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, first thing, my children were well-trained. We knew if we love our children, they had to be trained. When they did something wrong, if they kept on indulging in the thing that's wrong, then they would get a good spanking because we really knew that to love a child means you got to teach them right from wrong. And we practiced that.
  • [00:30:58.88] And we didn't have to worry about them going to policemen telling we whipped them because they would get a good spanking. And we weren't afraid to because they were our children. And we wanted them to do the right thing.
  • [00:31:14.58] SPEAKER 1: How old were your children? What were there names, like, from youngest to oldest?
  • [00:31:19.85] LOMAS SHAW: Well, the oldest one name was Slater-- S-L-A-T-E-R. And the youngest nine was EW, Emery [? Way ?] Shaw.
  • [00:31:33.40] SPEAKER 1: So how many children did you have?
  • [00:31:36.39] LOMAS SHAW: 12 siblings.
  • [00:31:37.94] SPEAKER 1: Children.
  • [00:31:39.17] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, me? You talking about me?
  • [00:31:40.42] SPEAKER 1: Yeah.
  • [00:31:40.76] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, excuse me. I was thinking about-- OK. We have seven children. Oldest one is Emily.
  • [00:31:49.14] SPEAKER 1: How old?
  • [00:31:50.59] LOMAS SHAW: I say Emily. Josepha.
  • [00:31:54.54] SPEAKER 1: And then all the names of the children.
  • [00:31:58.44] LOMAS SHAW: No, I ain't going to call the names. I won't call the names.
  • [00:32:01.17] SPEAKER 1: That's totally fine.
  • [00:32:02.61] LOMAS SHAW: OK.
  • [00:32:08.04] SPEAKER 1: Tell me about your working years, your working years, like what you did [INAUDIBLE].
  • [00:32:15.95] LOMAS SHAW: OK, after I get married, I came here. And I drove the bus and the streetcars. That was 1943. I started for the city of Detroit.
  • [00:32:34.40] I first started on the streetcar. Then I drove the streetcar for a number of years until the bus came in. Then I started driving the bus. And I drove them until I retired.
  • [00:32:53.02] SPEAKER 1: What was a typical day like during the working years in your adult life? The typical day.
  • [00:33:00.46] LOMAS SHAW: In my adult life?
  • [00:33:01.38] SPEAKER 1: Yes.
  • [00:33:01.99] LOMAS SHAW: Well, now, the typical day was it all depends what I was involved in or what season of the year. Now in the summertime, I'd play baseball. That was my main thing.
  • [00:33:16.24] And in the winter time, I'd go to school. And then I always enjoyed rabbit hunting. After I got out of school, especially on the weekends, I'd go to rabbit hunting.
  • [00:33:30.64] And then later on, sometime I go fishing. And those were very enjoyable days for me. And then we play ball at our house, just us [INAUDIBLE] family members would play baseball. We just have a good time.
  • [00:33:55.08] SPEAKER 1: So you used to play baseball with your children.
  • [00:33:57.34] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yes. Mm-hm.
  • [00:34:12.45] SPEAKER 1: Are there any special days, events, or family traditions you practiced that differ from your childhood traditions?
  • [00:34:21.67] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, we have what we call family reunion. And many members of the families would come together once a year. And we still are engaged in family reunion. We're looking with anticipatory expectancy of having a Shaw family reunion in August of this year.
  • [00:34:58.96] SPEAKER 1: So can you describe the popular music in your adult life that was going on in the world?
  • [00:35:07.76] LOMAS SHAW: "Precious Lord, Take My Hand." I like that song. Precious lord, take my hand. lead me on. Let me stand. That's one of my favorites.
  • [00:35:21.19] SPEAKER 1: Did you [INAUDIBLE] any particular dances at that time?
  • [00:35:25.28] LOMAS SHAW: No, I-- no, no.
  • [00:35:30.24] SPEAKER 1: And what were the popular clothing and hairstyles during that time?
  • [00:35:35.54] LOMAS SHAW: Well, now my parents always bought nice clothes for the children. And you say that during that time, we would wear double breasted coats along with the pants. And we'd always have our shoes polished and look nice. My parents would always see that when we go out, we would be dressed accordingly-- very nice. They were very careful about our dress code.
  • [00:36:16.52] SPEAKER 1: And you and your children-- how was the clothing about your family?
  • [00:36:23.96] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah, yeah. Oh yeah. We'd see that our children always dress appropriate for the occasion, all the time, regardless.
  • [00:36:33.11] Even now, they came up with that, you know. And they dress appropriate. You see how I'm dressed now?
  • [00:36:55.16] SPEAKER 1: And thinking back to your working adult life, were there any historical events that would take place, and did they affect your family around the place you lived or around the world? What historical event took place in--
  • [00:37:13.18] LOMAS SHAW: OK, no, no, no. No, even now, I don't know nothing historical taking place where I was born and where I grew up.
  • [00:37:22.84] SPEAKER 1: And like around the World War II time, did anything affect your family about it?
  • [00:37:31.51] LOMAS SHAW: No, I don't really--
  • [00:37:34.30] SPEAKER 1: OK, so this completes the section of your working years.
  • [00:37:38.22] LOMAS SHAW: OK.
  • [00:37:38.78] SPEAKER 1: Thank you.
  • [00:37:39.33] LOMAS SHAW: You're welcome.
  • [00:37:42.90] SPEAKER 1: Now about work and retirement-- this set of questions covers a fairly long period of your life from the time you entered the labor force or started a family, up to present time. So what was your main field of employment? How did you first get started with this tradition, skill, or job? What got you interested?
  • [00:38:09.70] LOMAS SHAW: What got me interested? I was looking for a job. And at that time, the bus driver job was open, streetcar. So I applied for that, and I passed it.
  • [00:38:25.26] SPEAKER 1: OK.
  • [00:38:25.75] LOMAS SHAW: Mm-hm.
  • [00:38:39.48] SPEAKER 1: Can you describe the steps or process involved in your job from start to finish? Like, how the job was like, like being a bus driver? How was it like?
  • [00:38:51.60] LOMAS SHAW: It was wonderful. I met lots of nice people. I'm glad I met him.
  • [00:38:58.40] A lot of people that I met became good friends. And then all the people, I always was very concerned about them. I'd be sure that they would get a place to sit on the bus if they possibly could. And if they were just coming to the bus to catch the bus or the streetcar and I saw them coming, I would wait on them cause they couldn't move as fast as some of the rest of them. I always gave them special, special consideration.
  • [00:39:42.39] SPEAKER 1: Were there any specific training or skills needed for the job?
  • [00:39:47.27] LOMAS SHAW: Absolutely. There was a four week training to drive the streetcar and about the same thing for the buses.
  • [00:39:58.85] SPEAKER 1: What technology changes occurred during your working years.
  • [00:40:04.76] LOMAS SHAW: Say that-- I didn't catch it.
  • [00:40:06.22] SPEAKER 1: What technology changes occurred during your working years?
  • [00:40:13.62] LOMAS SHAW: I pass on that. I don't understand.
  • [00:40:26.73] SPEAKER 1: What is the biggest difference in your main field of employment from the time you started until now?
  • [00:40:34.61] LOMAS SHAW: Repeat that again?
  • [00:40:36.20] SPEAKER 1: What is the biggest difference in your main field of employment from the time you started until now?
  • [00:40:43.86] LOMAS SHAW: Well, see, I'm retired now. I am a retired person. I worked-- how many years did I work? I worked for 39 years . I drove the bus for 39 year.
  • [00:41:01.61] SPEAKER 1: How do you judge excellence within your field? What makes someone respected in that field?
  • [00:41:08.62] LOMAS SHAW: Well, excellence is know what you're there. You're there to accommodate the people. You're there to accommodate. If you possibly can wait on the person-- you see him running to catch the bus, a streetcar.
  • [00:41:23.88] You can pause away for a second, few seconds. Do that because you know that's that means of transportation. And sometime you wait on him. And then they'll say thank you. And some won't say thank you.
  • [00:41:46.26] SPEAKER 1: What do you value most about what you did for a living?
  • [00:41:52.05] LOMAS SHAW: Well, I was able to send all my kids to school. I made means for that. So all of my children are well-educated and have good jobs.
  • [00:42:21.87] SPEAKER 1: Tell me about any moves you made during your working years and retirement before your decision to move to your current resident.
  • [00:42:32.46] LOMAS SHAW: Repeat that again. Let's see what you said.
  • [00:42:34.33] SPEAKER 1: Tell me about any moves you made during your working years and retirement.
  • [00:42:39.79] LOMAS SHAW: Well I guess-- let me pass on that.
  • [00:42:51.43] SPEAKER 1: So you lived in Detroit for your whole time. So you didn't move anywhere else. So it was always Detroit, Michigan?
  • [00:42:59.52] LOMAS SHAW: Always here in Detroit, uh huh. Mm-hm, right.
  • [00:43:06.83] SPEAKER 1: And how do you feel about your current living situation?
  • [00:43:11.05] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, I feel fine because I'm doing just well. And I have no problems. I'm glad I accepted the job that I did because everything is just working out fine for me and my family.
  • [00:43:39.00] SPEAKER 1: How did your family your life change for you when you and/or your spouse retired and all your children left home? How did your family life change when your children left?
  • [00:43:51.15] LOMAS SHAW: Well, it was different, wherein we each have a lot of noise at the house when the children are there. We buy them certain things.
  • [00:44:05.64] And after they moved out, we don't have all the laughing, the noise going on. Of course, there's nobody at home but my wife and me now. And it's a big difference.
  • [00:44:18.99] It used to be a lot of noise, playing, and carrying on. It's pretty quiet now. [INAUDIBLE].
  • [00:44:33.63] SPEAKER 1: So is your spouse still living?
  • [00:44:37.28] LOMAS SHAW: Yes.
  • [00:44:42.41] SPEAKER 1: What is a typical day in your life currently?
  • [00:44:48.22] LOMAS SHAW: Say that again.
  • [00:44:49.16] SPEAKER 1: What is the typical day for you in your life currently?
  • [00:44:53.36] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, celebrating our birthdays and our anniversary. Our anniversary is very special to us, our married anniversary.
  • [00:45:06.09] SPEAKER 1: And how is every day life for you? Every day, what do you? What's normal?
  • [00:45:12.90] LOMAS SHAW: Well, actually, then I like flowers. I have beautiful flowers. I used to have a vegetable garden. I like to work outside where I have nothing but beautiful, beautiful flowers.
  • [00:45:33.57] I spend a lot of time out in my yard. I have beautiful lawn. I keeps it beautiful, manicured. And that's what I'm doing now.
  • [00:45:50.39] SPEAKER 1: So working with your flowers right now is your personal favorite thing to do [INAUDIBLE]?
  • [00:45:57.28] LOMAS SHAW: Well, you got-- right now, they have to be worked to keep the weeds from choking them out. The weeds grow too, you know. You got to fertilize the flowers.
  • [00:46:10.20] And you got to water. If you're not getting the proper rain, you've got to water them. So there's always something to do if you want those flowers to continue to grow and to be beautiful like I like for them to be.
  • [00:46:27.97] SPEAKER 1: So taking care of your flowers is your favorite thing to do.
  • [00:46:31.15] LOMAS SHAW: It is my favorite thing to do now. Mm-hm.
  • [00:46:42.87] SPEAKER 1: What does your family enjoy doing together right now?
  • [00:46:46.52] LOMAS SHAW: Right now, what we enjoy is sometimes, we go out for lunch. Sometimes we go out for dinner. Sometime we get to just sit at home and do some singing.
  • [00:47:02.23] Sometimes we go out there and sit in the yard, look at the beautiful flowers. We have usually-- sometime we have once a year a lawn party.
  • [00:47:15.51] We invite people from the church and our friends that come around for this lawn party. And we feed down. And while we're outside, we get to have a tent. And while we're eating and enjoying ourselves, we look at the beautiful flowers. it's a beautiful picture to see.
  • [00:47:51.30] SPEAKER 1: When thinking back on your entire life, what important thing happened that had the greatest impact?
  • [00:48:01.60] LOMAS SHAW: When I accepted Jesus as my personal Savior, that had the greatest impact on my life. So I know when decease, when this life on this earth deceased, then I'll go to heaven and be with the lord.
  • [00:48:27.58] SPEAKER 1: This is my favorite question right now. Thinking back over your entire life, what are you most proud of?
  • [00:48:37.69] LOMAS SHAW: Well, I thought I just answered that question. I'm most proud of my children were successful. The job that they have is just wonderful.
  • [00:48:53.37] And I'm glad that I sent them to school. They got good education. They have not been sick as of now. All of them seem to have good health. And I'm just proud of that.
  • [00:49:16.55] SPEAKER 1: What would you say has changed most from the time you were my age until now?
  • [00:49:22.05] LOMAS SHAW: Well, I'm older. Therefore, that's change. I can't do like I used to do.
  • [00:49:31.12] Of course, I'm proud that the Lord have made it possible for me to do what I am doing. I'm not complaining because at 94 year though, I still drive the cars. I still do the work around the house. I do my flowers. So I'm all right.
  • [00:49:58.93] SPEAKER 1: What advice would you give to my generation?
  • [00:50:03.56] LOMAS SHAW: To go to school, to get an education. Don't get on drugs-- not one time. Don't smoke no drugs, no dope-- not one time.
  • [00:50:18.92] And for the boys, pull your pants up. Don't have your pants down where people can see your drawers [INAUDIBLE]. When you go out dressed decent-- when you go and get a job, dress decent.
  • [00:50:35.48] And then watch your language. Don't use filthy language. Don't smoke cigarettes. They're no good for you And ask the lord to come into your life and take over your life and be your boss.
  • [00:50:57.57] SPEAKER 1: Is there anything you would like to add that I haven't asked about that [INAUDIBLE]?
  • [00:51:04.36] LOMAS SHAW: I don't think-- nothing I can add to what you-- to the questions you asked me.
  • [00:51:10.46] SPEAKER 1: Like, anything special? Like, any experiences [INAUDIBLE]?
  • [00:51:15.44] LOMAS SHAW: No, you did a wonderful job. You did an excellent job.
  • [00:51:20.08] SPEAKER 1: So this completes the interview for today.
  • [00:51:24.12] LOMAS SHAW: Thank you very kindly.
  • [00:51:25.49] SPEAKER 3: Thank you.
  • [00:51:26.63] LOMAS SHAW: You're welcome.
  • [00:51:35.58] SPEAKER 4: 2.
  • [00:51:40.98] SPEAKER 5: It's time to turn off or silence all cell phones, pagers, or anything else that beeps, chimes, or makes noises. So if you've got a phone, turn it down, please.
  • [00:51:51.07] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [00:51:54.04] SPEAKER 5: Huh?
  • [00:51:54.53] SPEAKER 6: Never mind.
  • [00:51:56.74] SPEAKER 5: You can call for break at any time that you want one. Also, please remember that you can decline to answer any questions or end the interview at any time for any reason. You brought a picture with you today?
  • [00:52:08.33] LOMAS SHAW: Huh?
  • [00:52:09.07] SPEAKER 5: You brought pitchers with you today?
  • [00:52:10.49] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, uh-huh.
  • [00:52:11.32] SPEAKER 5: Would you like to show some?
  • [00:52:12.53] LOMAS SHAW: , Yeah he told me to bring-- yeah.
  • [00:52:15.67] SPEAKER 5: Can I see some of them?
  • [00:52:16.54] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah. Uh-huh, yeah. Yeah Yeah, just look and then get what you want.
  • [00:52:21.58] SPEAKER 5: Oh, you can pull them out and just like show them to the camera.
  • [00:52:24.79] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, I see. [INAUDIBLE]. OK.
  • [00:52:30.94] Let's see here. Now can you show this, or is it too large [INAUDIBLE]? Is this too large?
  • [00:52:41.52] SPEAKER 5: No, it's fine.
  • [00:52:42.50] LOMAS SHAW: OK.
  • [00:52:45.92] SPEAKER 5: You can go-- he can hold it up. He can hold it up. And tell us the story behind it if there is an.
  • [00:52:55.28] SPEAKER 4: Oh, is that your garden?
  • [00:53:00.06] LOMAS SHAW: That's my flower garden.
  • [00:53:01.86] SPEAKER 5: It's very pretty. How many different flowers do you have there?
  • [00:53:06.24] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, I have a lot of flowers. I go all out for flowers. Beautiful yard.
  • [00:53:13.28] SPEAKER 4: Sorry. Are you recording?
  • [00:53:15.15] SPEAKER 5: Yeah. OK. You can show us another picture.
  • [00:53:22.97] LOMAS SHAW: You got it?
  • [00:53:23.68] SPEAKER 5: Mm-hm.
  • [00:53:24.06] LOMAS SHAW: OK, now let's see this here. Let's see here. I got the pictures, I was in the newspaper.
  • [00:54:29.73] I wanted to show you that. Let's see. That picture there. Oh, Is this the way, we should do it like this?
  • [00:55:05.45] SPEAKER 5: Mm-hm. What were you in the newspaper for?
  • [00:55:18.08] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, I was visiting the sick people at [? Harper ?] Hospital. And the news came along and took my picture.
  • [00:55:34.32] SPEAKER 4: Yes, I got it.
  • [00:55:36.28] LOMAS SHAW: You got it?
  • [00:55:37.01] SPEAKER 4: Yes.
  • [00:55:37.46] LOMAS SHAW: That's it?
  • [00:55:38.20] SPEAKER 4: Yeah.
  • [00:55:38.48] LOMAS SHAW: OK. Now I had a lawn party. And I had a 70th anniversary celebration. Been married 71 years. You gonna stay married that long?
  • [00:56:00.26] SPEAKER 5: I hope so.
  • [00:56:01.95] LOMAS SHAW: You can do it. You can do it. You can do it. OK, [INAUDIBLE] see here. Let's see.
  • [00:56:28.74] SPEAKER 5: Where is that picture from?
  • [00:56:30.37] LOMAS SHAW: This was taken at home. This is my daughter. She's working on her doctorate now. OK.
  • [00:56:50.31] SPEAKER 5: When you zoom in, zoom in and keep it there for five seconds, OK?
  • [00:57:00.53] LOMAS SHAW: This is my son.
  • [00:57:14.82] SPEAKER 5: What mall is that in the background?
  • [00:57:20.16] LOMAS SHAW: Can you say that part?
  • [00:57:21.38] SPEAKER 5: What's that place in the background?
  • [00:57:23.72] SPEAKER 4: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [00:57:24.51] LOMAS SHAW: [INAUDIBLE] oh yeah, that's where he was selling-- he run a hot dog stand. And he was selling there, and that;s the background. Here, this is me in my flower garden.
  • [00:57:37.26] SPEAKER 5: That is really pretty.
  • [00:57:39.21] LOMAS SHAW: Thank you.
  • [00:57:40.80] SPEAKER 5: It looked more run like a flower shop, like you sell a whole bunch of flowers.
  • [00:57:46.38] SPEAKER 6: I need to start me up a flower garden.
  • [00:57:48.99] SPEAKER 5: I had a garden before, but it was for vegetables and stuff.
  • [00:57:53.08] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [00:57:55.32] LOMAS SHAW: You like flowers?
  • [00:57:56.71] SPEAKER 5: I like flowers, but I don't know how to plant them.
  • [00:57:59.49] LOMAS SHAW: OK.
  • [00:57:59.60] SPEAKER 5: We did plant some, but we were mostly making fruit and vegetables.
  • [00:58:03.30] LOMAS SHAW: OK. OK, this is my wife, my daughter, and some more friend.
  • [00:58:25.36] SPEAKER 4: Who's that again in the picture? Who's that in the picture?
  • [00:58:31.76] LOMAS SHAW: Say--
  • [00:58:33.20] SPEAKER 4: Who is it on the picture?
  • [00:58:34.85] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, my wife. That's me, my wife, my daughter, and some old friends.
  • [00:58:40.46] SPEAKER 4: OK.
  • [00:58:40.94] LOMAS SHAW: Uh-huh.
  • [00:58:51.04] SPEAKER 4: OK.
  • [00:58:51.54] LOMAS SHAW: OK. Now here's [INAUDIBLE].
  • [00:59:01.21] SPEAKER 5: That's really pretty.
  • [00:59:02.35] SPEAKER 4: Wow.
  • [00:59:02.82] SPEAKER 5: That's cool. How long did it take you to make that garden that big?
  • [00:59:07.66] LOMAS SHAW: No, it doesn't take long, because I like to do it and I know how to do it. See--
  • [00:59:12.69] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE] in a constellation.
  • [00:59:15.69] SPEAKER 5: Yeah, it should be in a contest or something. Because when you say garden, I'm like OK, just a couple of flowers. And then it's huge.
  • [00:59:21.59] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah. OK.
  • [00:59:22.96] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [00:59:24.69] LOMAS SHAW: Now let's see. Where-- I want to get the mayor. here I took some pictures [INAUDIBLE].
  • [00:59:57.54] SPEAKER 6: Is that a trowel in your hand in that picture?
  • [01:00:01.30] LOMAS SHAW: That's a--
  • [01:00:02.31] SPEAKER 6: Trowel?
  • [01:00:05.22] LOMAS SHAW: I don't know what that is. I don't know what it is.
  • [01:00:09.39] SPEAKER 6: Oh no, that's your hat. I'm blind.
  • [01:00:14.00] LOMAS SHAW: OK. OK, now this is my son, his wife, and my wife.
  • [01:00:23.90] SPEAKER 6: His wife had pretty hair.
  • [01:00:25.62] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
  • [01:00:35.04] SPEAKER 5: OK. They both have pretty smiles. I was looking at them like [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:00:39.64] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE] Is that a red shed in the next door neighbor's yard? I'm Sorry.
  • [01:00:56.88] I just notice the obvious things. Never mind. Ignore my question.
  • [01:01:05.69] LOMAS SHAW: Let's see here
  • [01:01:06.34] SPEAKER 5: [INAUDIBLE]. Yeah, come on.
  • [01:01:09.66] LOMAS SHAW: You see I like flowers. You see the flowers.
  • [01:01:12.83] SPEAKER 5: So you got, like, carnations, poppies, some other flower I don't remember the name of. Are these annuals or perennials or? You know what? I'm [INAUDIBLE] a hundred flowers from there.
  • [01:01:25.69] LOMAS SHAW: Y'all going to have to come out. I have a lawn party every year. Y'all are going to have to come out to my lawn party.
  • [01:01:31.80] SPEAKER 5: Cool.
  • [01:01:32.64] LOMAS SHAW: Mm-hm.
  • [01:01:33.11] SPEAKER 5: I mean, is [INAUDIBLE] going to come back from [INAUDIBLE] Grand Valley?
  • [01:01:36.48] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, OK.
  • [01:01:37.78] SPEAKER 5: And bring her, you'll have to drag her back from Grand Valley.
  • [01:01:40.07] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, you can see? That's right. Bless your heart. Let's see here. I'm looking for--
  • [01:01:59.23] SPEAKER 6: So would you see your garden is one of your prized possession?
  • [01:02:02.56] LOMAS SHAW: That's right. Yes, ma'am.
  • [01:02:04.74] SPEAKER 5: Should be as pretty as it is.
  • [01:02:06.70] LOMAS SHAW: I go all out for flowers. And then I have a vegetable garden in the back.
  • [01:02:12.31] SPEAKER 5: Oh, he don't know [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:02:13.41] LOMAS SHAW: I should have brought y'all some tomatoes. You like tomatoes?
  • [01:02:15.94] SPEAKER 5: I like green ones.
  • [01:02:17.62] LOMAS SHAW: You like green?
  • [01:02:18.49] SPEAKER 5: Green fried ones.
  • [01:02:19.51] LOMAS SHAW: You from the south?
  • [01:02:20.83] SPEAKER 5: No, my mom make-- I just made some last night.
  • [01:02:23.85] LOMAS SHAW: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:02:24.59] SPEAKER 6: --like three days ago.
  • [01:02:25.93] SPEAKER 5: They were good.
  • [01:02:26.66] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah.
  • [01:02:26.97] SPEAKER 4: [INAUDIBLE] green tomatoes.
  • [01:02:29.40] LOMAS SHAW: You never had any?
  • [01:02:30.18] SPEAKER 4: No.
  • [01:02:31.06] SPEAKER 5: You should have them. You just like--
  • [01:02:32.59] SPEAKER 4: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:02:34.04] SPEAKER 5: No, you, like, cut him up, put them in some batter, season it, firm. Woof!
  • [01:02:39.07] SPEAKER 6: You know what? Now we've got to make some. I'm gonna go over your house and make some [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:02:42.00] SPEAKER 5: Oh, they all-- I already cooked them. It was good too.
  • [01:02:45.43] LOMAS SHAW: I don't like green tomatoes. I don't like the taste. My mother used to fry them, but I didn't like them.
  • [01:02:50.98] SPEAKER 5: They taste sweet, and that's what I like about them. it's like a sweet, spicy [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:02:55.74] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE] tomatoes.
  • [01:02:57.67] SPEAKER 5: Tomatoes taste like earth.
  • [01:02:59.00] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE] they taste awesome.
  • [01:03:02.88] LOMAS SHAW: I'm looking for--
  • [01:03:06.76] SPEAKER 6: Can we [INAUDIBLE]?
  • [01:03:09.67] SPEAKER 5: This?
  • [01:03:10.15] SPEAKER 6: Yeah.
  • [01:03:11.12] SPEAKER 5: [INAUDIBLE] it goes over, but then we [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:03:18.52] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:03:20.02] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah.
  • [01:03:20.47] SPEAKER 5: It goes lower, but then we may have to stop--
  • [01:03:22.82] LOMAS SHAW: I don't know where-- This probably was at the-- I don't know where this was taken. Can you see this?
  • [01:03:28.28] SPEAKER 4: Yes.
  • [01:03:34.50] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:03:38.94] SPEAKER 4: I got it? Yes, I got it.
  • [01:03:44.39] SPEAKER 5: That's you and your wife?
  • [01:03:46.08] LOMAS SHAW: Mm-hm. That's it?
  • [01:03:48.58] SPEAKER 4: Yes.
  • [01:03:49.07] LOMAS SHAW: All right. Yeah, that's-- OK, this is my three daughters-- three daughters.
  • [01:04:12.57] SPEAKER 5: They all have great hair.
  • [01:04:24.48] SPEAKER 4: OK [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:04:28.44] SPEAKER 5: Leave it there longer next time because [INAUDIBLE] is going to edit that.
  • [01:04:33.40] SPEAKER 4: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:04:42.85] SPEAKER 5: I had a question about your son's hot dog stand. I think I ate there, got a hot dog there from him [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:04:47.58] LOMAS SHAW: [INAUDIBLE]?
  • [01:04:48.85] SPEAKER 5: Your son's hot dog stand.
  • [01:04:50.72] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, you probably-- you could probably--
  • [01:04:52.97] SPEAKER 5: [INAUDIBLE] got a hot dog from there before.
  • [01:04:54.05] LOMAS SHAW: Downtown? Yeah, he be downtown now. You probably-- you probably have.
  • [01:05:01.39] Yeah, he be downtown.
  • [01:05:06.02] SPEAKER 5: I just come, put it on that.
  • [01:05:09.23] SPEAKER 6: Shame.
  • [01:05:11.18] SPEAKER 5: Sometimes, I don't even comb it. That's the shame.
  • [01:05:13.01] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:05:14.43] LOMAS SHAW: The mayor of [INAUDIBLE]-- that's what I'm trying to find. The mayor of [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:05:20.96] SPEAKER 5: --I mean, once in a while just so I can cut it. But I don't even like doing that.
  • [01:05:25.02] LOMAS SHAW: Let's see here.
  • [01:05:27.67] SPEAKER 5: I'm scared of hot stuff.
  • [01:05:30.95] SPEAKER 4: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:05:36.23] SPEAKER 6: I think if I had a flower [INAUDIBLE] just make bouquets and just give them out to everybody I see.
  • [01:05:40.80] SPEAKER 5: Here you go, sir. Have a wonderful day.
  • [01:05:43.34] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE] for your wife, or your girlfriend or your significant other. I would do something like that, too.
  • [01:05:51.64] SPEAKER 5: When we had our garden, we used to let people get the vegetables from over there. We didn't do fruit. We just did, like, tomatoes and corn, greens.
  • [01:05:59.52] SPEAKER 6: See, my vegetable gardens made a profit.
  • [01:06:02.85] SPEAKER 5: No, we just shared it with the--
  • [01:06:04.51] SPEAKER 6: Except for the watermelons.
  • [01:06:06.09] SPEAKER 5: Like, they would just be in the backyard.
  • [01:06:08.34] LOMAS SHAW: You like watermelon?
  • [01:06:09.42] SPEAKER 6: Yeah.
  • [01:06:10.08] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, I used to grow.
  • [01:06:11.26] SPEAKER 6: But we just used to give watermelons out. We liked to [INAUDIBLE] club president.
  • [01:06:19.84] SPEAKER 5: I like eating watermelon with a spoon.
  • [01:06:21.45] LOMAS SHAW: This is the shirt I had on in this picture here. Had this shirt on.
  • [01:06:29.79] SPEAKER 5: Was that at your garden party?
  • [01:06:32.11] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah. I have about over 100 people there. What church to go to?
  • [01:06:43.25] SPEAKER 5: St. Ambrose.
  • [01:06:44.61] LOMAS SHAW: What do you go to? Which one you go to?
  • [01:06:47.12] SPEAKER 6: I go to the Silver Star Kingdom Christian Fellowship.
  • [01:06:50.44] LOMAS SHAW: OK, so you're a Christian.
  • [01:06:51.49] SPEAKER 6: I'm about to go to [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:06:54.81] LOMAS SHAW: Ah. A-ha. I go to Tabernacle. You ever hear of Tabernacle? That's where I go.
  • [01:07:01.05] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:07:03.50] LOMAS SHAW: That's where. Tabernacle.
  • [01:07:08.75] SPEAKER 5: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:07:10.00] LOMAS SHAW: I can't find the picture I was looking for. [INAUDIBLE] Detroit.
  • [01:07:16.07] SPEAKER 5: Grand Rapids.
  • [01:07:18.47] SPEAKER 4: Grand Rapids. That's the biggest place [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:07:25.67] SPEAKER 6: OK, OK. You can't just talk about Grand Rapids High School like that, because, you know, I wanted to go there, but it was too far. It was a bus ride and a drive.
  • [01:07:33.21] SPEAKER 5: [INAUDIBLE] You had to move, Cecilia.
  • [01:07:38.06] SPEAKER 6: Don't spoil my dream, OK?
  • [01:07:40.90] SPEAKER 4: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:07:42.22] LOMAS SHAW: This again.
  • [01:07:46.62] SPEAKER 6: So who's that?
  • [01:07:47.98] LOMAS SHAW: This is my friend Reverend Bruce and Eleanor and Virginia, the other church members. He's a preacher, the gentleman in the middle. I don't know what I did with that picture.
  • [01:08:15.79] Man, I don't know. I know I had that picture. OK.
  • [01:08:27.20] SPEAKER 5: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:08:29.64] LOMAS SHAW: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:08:34.05] SPEAKER 5: Oh, is that a family photo?
  • [01:08:36.51] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, uh-huh. Yeah. This is my sister and me. She deceased.
  • [01:08:58.01] SPEAKER 5: Who's the little girl?
  • [01:08:59.56] LOMAS SHAW: Uh-huh. That's my sister. She was a twin.
  • [01:09:06.56] SPEAKER 6: The little girl in the picture with the white on. Who is she?
  • [01:09:10.82] LOMAS SHAW: I'll have to look and see who she is.
  • [01:09:24.22] SPEAKER 5: OK.
  • [01:09:28.65] LOMAS SHAW: The little girl-- oh, that's my granddaughter, Treasure. She's a treasure too. That Treasure is a treasure, I tell you. You've got to meet Treasure. You've got to meet treasure. Oh, this is my doctor, Dr. Powell. Anybody know Dr. Powell?
  • [01:09:47.88] SPEAKER 5: I've heard of him.
  • [01:09:49.14] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, he's a prostate cancer man, urologist. He operate on me in 1993, before you were born.
  • [01:10:00.18] SPEAKER 5: Only by a year.
  • [01:10:01.66] LOMAS SHAW: Mm-hm. OK, all right. [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:10:09.98] I can't find this, so I'm just gonna let it go.
  • [01:10:32.26] Well, I'm proud of y'all. I'm proud of y'all. I've seen you young people doing something. I'm telling you. It just makes my heart feel rejoiced.
  • [01:10:44.49] So many of our young people have been caught up in the dope, drug, and mess their lives up so quickly. I'm telling you. So one Sunday, I want you to come to my church, you hear?
  • [01:10:59.64] You hear me? Really, come one Sunday. You say you know where Tabernacle is?
  • [01:11:05.57] SPEAKER 5: I heard of it before.
  • [01:11:07.16] LOMAS SHAW: It's right on West Grand Boulevard and Grand River.
  • [01:11:10.54] SPEAKER 5: Is it by downtown, wherever it is?
  • [01:11:14.18] SPEAKER 6: I don't know [INAUDIBLE] West Grand Boulevard.
  • [01:11:18.55] SPEAKER 5: Because ain't West Grand Boulevard-- Where's that downtown?
  • [01:11:21.32] SPEAKER 6: West Grand Boulevard is [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:11:23.18] LOMAS SHAW: This [INAUDIBLE], please. Yeah, Right on Grand River and West Grand Boulevard-- Tabernacle Baptist Church.
  • [01:11:33.88] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:11:40.87] SPEAKER 5: OK.
  • [01:12:04.78] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, I want to say thank you. Thank you very kindly.
  • [01:12:10.05] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:12:12.39] SPEAKER 5: Mr. Shaw?
  • [01:12:13.72] LOMAS SHAW: Yes.
  • [01:12:14.79] SPEAKER 6: A picture right here.
  • [01:12:16.07] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. OK.
  • [01:12:19.40] Yeah, that's other one. Thank you. Thank you. I don't know why-- I don't know why the mayor--
  • [01:12:28.10] SPEAKER 5: Did you look on the bottom half?
  • [01:12:30.19] LOMAS SHAW: I did, and I'm going through all of them again. Let's see. [INAUDIBLE] might have left it in here. [INAUDIBLE] I didn't get this one.
  • [01:12:59.30] SPEAKER 5: When did you start your garden?
  • [01:13:01.40] LOMAS SHAW: I usually start my garden after the 30th of May, when there won't be no more frost. As a rule, the 30th of May is about the last frost we have. So after the 30th of May, I start my garden.
  • [01:13:19.23] Thank you.
  • [01:13:48.60] So I'd be glad for y'all all to come out and visit us. We'll make it nice for you, have plenty to eat. We have plenty food. I don't know what I could have done with that picture.
  • [01:14:12.20] SPEAKER 6: Next week [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:14:14.51] SPEAKER 5: [INAUDIBLE] next week?
  • [01:14:16.31] SPEAKER 6: Yep.
  • [01:14:17.51] SPEAKER 5: [INAUDIBLE] I was going to take about that long.
  • [01:14:23.09] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:14:24.59] SPEAKER 5: OK, that's fine, because I don't like [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:14:31.02] SPEAKER 4: [INAUDIBLE] do the cutting.
  • [01:14:39.92] SPEAKER 5: Do you know how to do that? I'll show you.
  • [01:14:44.51] SPEAKER 4: Yeah, you'll show me. [INAUDIBLE] put them together [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:14:57.26] SPEAKER 6: I need to work on my AMV.
  • [01:14:59.23] SPEAKER 5: Hm?
  • [01:14:59.72] SPEAKER 6: I need to work on my AMV. Anime music video.
  • [01:15:04.77] SPEAKER 5: Oh. Why you want to just say that?
  • [01:15:07.07] SPEAKER 6: Because--
  • [01:15:07.94] SPEAKER 5: I need to work on my video, but I'm not doing it today. I'm doing it tomorrow, and we'll do it next week, I guess. Should still be here nice week.
  • [01:15:16.45] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE] video, the pictures [INAUDIBLE] half [INAUDIBLE] the music is [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:15:31.75] SPEAKER 4: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:15:32.24] SPEAKER 5: Did you put this on pause [INAUDIBLE] picture? Should have already take like--
  • [01:15:38.12] SPEAKER 6: Pause it. Is that your lawn party again?
  • [01:15:48.53] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah. they was sitting next to my daughter's house. Our houses are right together-- my daughter and my house. So they were sitting in the back of her house. And that's my house on the other side there.
  • [01:16:06.40] SPEAKER 5: You get to see her a lot, then, huh?
  • [01:16:08.59] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, don't I? Yeah, she's in North Carolina now.
  • [01:16:16.64] SPEAKER 6: Does she's still have the property?
  • [01:16:18.05] LOMAS SHAW: Yes, she's the dean of [INAUDIBLE] High School. You heard of [INAUDIBLE] High School?
  • [01:16:21.65] SPEAKER 5: Never heard of it, but that's good.
  • [01:16:22.95] LOMAS SHAW: [INAUDIBLE]. Yeah.
  • [01:16:24.76] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE] I could [INAUDIBLE] high school and colleges [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:16:31.31] LOMAS SHAW: Ah, yeah, OK. Yeah, she was the dean until she wanted to take her doctorate. And so she's teaching. They let her teach instead of being a dean so she could take her class and be a-- she taking her doctorate. Like my daughter. My daughter already got her doctorate. My son is a psychiatrist.
  • [01:17:01.94] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE] psychiatrist.
  • [01:17:09.96] LOMAS SHAW: And I want to thank you.
  • [01:17:12.58] SPEAKER 4: Oh, thank you.
  • [01:17:21.93] LOMAS SHAW: When it going to be ready for the interview? You never know, do you?
  • [01:17:25.27] SPEAKER 5: Hm?
  • [01:17:26.04] LOMAS SHAW: When it going to be ready for the interview?
  • [01:17:30.67] SPEAKER 5: We're done today, I guess, as you showed us the pictures just.
  • [01:17:33.85] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, that was it?
  • [01:17:34.75] SPEAKER 6: Unless you have any additional stories or something you want to tell us you haven't already said.
  • [01:17:38.71] LOMAS SHAW: [CHUCKLES] oh, this is it, huh? OK. Well, bless your heart.
  • [01:17:46.46] SPEAKER 1: Or If you like any stories, like, great experience with your friends when you were young or--
  • [01:17:55.31] LOMAS SHAW: When I was what?
  • [01:17:56.10] SPEAKER 1: When you were young, like in high school, if you like went out and something funny or something happened like this, a great story.
  • [01:18:05.19] LOMAS SHAW: OK.
  • [01:18:05.67] SPEAKER 1: If you know [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:18:10.36] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE] stories from high school [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:18:18.99] LOMAS SHAW: [INAUDIBLE]. Well, let me see. Well, when went to-- see, I was raised in the country. Yeah, I was raised in the country on a farm.
  • [01:18:49.10] And I went to school in the country. So when I got a little older and ready to into high school, I went to Greenbelt, South Carolina, Sterling High School. Now I thought that was it.
  • [01:19:07.66] And it was a nice school. So back home, where I was read up. And they call me Lomas.
  • [01:19:20.85] And so when I-- L-O-M-A-S, Lomas. And so when I went to Sterling high school in Greenbelt, they didn't call me Lomas. They call me Low Mass.
  • [01:19:33.48] So when I went back home, my friends, my buddies, my cousin started calling me Lomas again. So I straightened them out right away.
  • [01:19:44.64] I said, uh-uh. My name ain't no Lomas. My name is Low Mass.
  • [01:19:50.56] And they thought that was so funny. And I was sincere about that. And then when I-- later on, I started playing football.
  • [01:20:03.74] You know, I was my first year in high school. And so now I'm going to a big school. Now I got to act dignified, you know?
  • [01:20:14.82] So they would call. They would say to me, did you play football? I say, yes-- not football, but I played feetball.
  • [01:20:29.79] See, I had to be proper. You know-- yeah, a little football. My daddy laughed until he cried when I said feetball.
  • [01:20:38.19] Well, I had to let them know I've been to high school. I got to talk English rightly. And so we had a lot of fun.
  • [01:20:50.75] We had a lot-- they teased me about that for three years, feetball. That's about the only real experience I had that I thought were real funny.
  • [01:21:16.03] SPEAKER 5: There wasn't anything else?
  • [01:21:17.61] LOMAS SHAW: No, that's about it. That's about the size of it.
  • [01:21:23.83] SPEAKER 7: If there's one piece of advice or one gift that you could give to this young generation, what would that be?
  • [01:21:33.65] LOMAS SHAW: Well, number one, accept Jesus as your personal savior. That's number one. That's the main thing.
  • [01:21:46.45] Be sure that you get a good education. Don't follow the crowd that's out there into drugs, whiskey, stealing, all that kind of stuff. Don't-- pull away from that crowd because the chances are you can get wiped up in that before you know it.
  • [01:22:13.09] Now, I'm a tell you. Our bodies cannot handle drugs. Drugs [INAUDIBLE] the body.
  • [01:22:23.10] They destroy you. So whatever you do, don't-- not even one-- don't smoke one cigarette, not a drug. Don't smoke not one time because you can get hooked on just one.
  • [01:22:39.07] Now, your little buddies-- I call them little buddies. If they did drugs, you don't need to be around them. Pull away from them because that's bad influence for you because you can ruin your life at an early stage, destroy your life completely. And once it's destroyed, your life is destroyed, it's hard to revamp it.
  • [01:23:08.92] So that's my advice to you. You've doing a wonderful job. You're in school and you're on the right road.
  • [01:23:17.56] And then another thing, young ladies. If you see these boys walking around here with the britches down-- I call the britches down-- where you can see you're not supposed to see, you don't need to hang with him. That's not a good thing.
  • [01:23:36.58] When you go and looking for a job, be dressed decent. And then it's a good thing if you-- when they ask you a question that you're able to answer the question intelligently. So be sure, when you're looking for a job, dress properly.
  • [01:24:01.01] And then sometime, you go to a place where they train you how to face the people who you would have to face in looking for a job. So be sure you dress decent. And then another thing-- don't use bad language.
  • [01:24:22.92] Don't use bad-- be nice. Be intelligent. Use good English.
  • [01:24:31.14] Don't get out there with that whole language, you know, nobody want to hear because you never know who you're talking with. So in other words, make a good showing. And that will help you to get a job also.
  • [01:24:46.20] But I guess the main thing is go to school. Don't drop out because it's a technology age. And I'm telling you, there ain't going to be no welfare.
  • [01:25:01.84] You can forget about that. They dun told you. So go and go to school. That's the most important thing-- accepting Jesus as your personal savior, go to school.
  • [01:25:16.39] SPEAKER 7: Follow up on this.
  • [01:25:18.43] LOMAS SHAW: Thank you. You so [INAUDIBLE]. You encourage it.
  • [01:25:26.54] SPEAKER 5: When you went to college, what did you study?
  • [01:25:30.08] LOMAS SHAW: When I went to school? Education. I went into education. And believe it or not-- and that's what I really wanted to do.
  • [01:25:39.75] So when I came here to Detroit, you know what I did? I like bus driving. I got a job driving buses and streetcars.
  • [01:25:54.13] And I liked it because I like people. I'm a people person. I enjoy being around people.
  • [01:26:05.19] And so I sent my children to school. I have 12-- listen to me. Seven children. All of them have good education, every one of them.
  • [01:26:18.69] I sent them to school. My daddy believed in education. He sent his children-- he has 12 siblings. And every one that wanted to go to school went to school, to college. And I had to [? let him ?] see how many teachers.
  • [01:26:34.37] [? Nellavie ?] was a teacher. [? Zelamie ?] was a teacher. Anna [? Lee ?] was a teacher.
  • [01:26:41.66] That's four were teachers [INAUDIBLE] school. Because as long as they can keep you uneducated, they keep you in the dark. As long as you're in the dark, you don't know which way to go because it's dark.
  • [01:26:59.07] And somebody has to lead you. And they won't lead you out into the light. They won't open up the light for you.
  • [01:27:06.66] So go to school so you can know what's going on because as long as you-- like I said, as long as you go to school, you're in the light. If you don't, you're in darkness. And if you're in darkness, somebody will have to lead you, right?
  • [01:27:29.30] You can't see. That's right. And they don't want you to see.
  • [01:27:35.83] They want to keep you in the dark so they can tell you things and you don't know know better. They can lead you any way they want to go because you can't see cause that's-- education is a light. Education is a light. It leads you in the path where you need to be.
  • [01:28:02.84] SPEAKER 5: You said once before that you used to hunt rabbits and stuff like that.
  • [01:28:06.89] LOMAS SHAW: Huh?
  • [01:28:07.16] SPEAKER 5: Used to hunt rabbits.
  • [01:28:08.60] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, I used to hunt rabbits. Oh yeah, I used to-- I stopped hunting about six years ago, about six years ago. I hunted after I got here from South Carolina. I hunted for years. that's one of my enjoyments-- rabbit hunting and pheasant.
  • [01:28:27.35] SPEAKER 5: Did you used to eat them?
  • [01:28:28.79] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, rabbits are good. My mother could cook some rabbit. I'm telling you too.
  • [01:28:34.07] Now she would make rabbit gravy. And that rabbit gravy was worth eating, I'll tell you. You'll hurt yourself eating rabbit gravy. Oh yeah.
  • [01:28:43.79] SPEAKER 5: Is it like sweet or something?
  • [01:28:45.59] LOMAS SHAW: Huh?
  • [01:28:46.07] SPEAKER 5: Is it sweet or--
  • [01:28:47.70] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah, you know what a rabbit is, don't you?
  • [01:28:51.46] SPEAKER 5: Mm-hm.
  • [01:28:51.84] LOMAS SHAW: Uh-huh. Well, you just make the gravy off of it, just like chicken gravy. You know. You make gravy off of it.
  • [01:29:00.03] And I'm telling you. I can make that gravy. I can make rabbit gravy. When my children at home, know I'm going to make rabbit gravy, they're going to be there to eat some of that rabbit gravy.
  • [01:29:14.40] SPEAKER 6: OK, so what's your favorite meal? Sticking on top of food, what's your favorite meal of all times?
  • [01:29:20.73] LOMAS SHAW: I can eat okra and corn every day.
  • [01:29:24.35] SPEAKER 6: Fried okra or what?
  • [01:29:26.18] LOMAS SHAW: Well, my mother, didn't exactly fry it. She would stew it. Like, she would put tomatoes in it, cook it with tomatoes.
  • [01:29:34.01] That keeps the slime down. You know, okra can be slimy. And if you put tomatoes in there, and butter-- I love butter-- and water, then you got something. I'm probably going to have okra for dinner today.
  • [01:29:50.18] I still grow okra. I like okra. And that's one of my favorite meals, foods, is okra. Now a lot of people eat opossum. You ever heard of opossum?
  • [01:30:05.90] SPEAKER 5: No
  • [01:30:06.65] LOMAS SHAW: No, [INAUDIBLE] not. They say they feed in the graveyard. That's what they say because we don't possum.
  • [01:30:15.88] We never eat possum. But my daddy used to hunt them. We hunt them at night.
  • [01:30:21.18] SPEAKER 6: It's easier to get them. I like hunting too. So, you know.
  • [01:30:27.66] LOMAS SHAW: Huh?
  • [01:30:28.55] SPEAKER 6: I like hunting too.
  • [01:30:29.90] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, you like hunting? Is that-- have you been hunting?
  • [01:30:33.03] SPEAKER 6: I've been-- I use bow and arrows instead of rifles. So--
  • [01:30:35.66] LOMAS SHAW: Say now what?
  • [01:30:36.83] SPEAKER 6: I use the archery style instead of rifles. Because, you know, [INAUDIBLE] as you hit it, it goes in the rest of the meat around it. Even if I don't eat the meat, I just like--
  • [01:30:46.61] LOMAS SHAW: Is that right? Well, what do you know? Now that's a rare thing for a female to go hunting.
  • [01:30:58.25] SPEAKER 6: That's what [INAUDIBLE] and camp.
  • [01:31:00.32] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, I used to enjoy. And you did do some hunting.
  • [01:31:10.12] SPEAKER 6: Mm-hm.
  • [01:31:10.55] LOMAS SHAW: Well, look [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:31:12.65] SPEAKER 6: I'm good at archery. [INAUDIBLE] that.
  • [01:31:15.04] LOMAS SHAW: Say what?
  • [01:31:16.02] SPEAKER 6: Ask [? Cat. ?] She's pretty good at archery.
  • [01:31:19.10] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah?
  • [01:31:19.90] SPEAKER 6: Somewhat
  • [01:31:22.22] SPEAKER 5: Bow and arrow.
  • [01:31:25.53] LOMAS SHAW: Well, I'll tell you. I used to do a lot of fishing too. Now that really is a good relaxation. Man, you throw that hook in there and you go and you feel something pulling you. You wind it up. You got a big old fish on your hook.
  • [01:31:48.05] SPEAKER 6: Do you use live bait like night crawlers, or do you use bread and meet and all that stuff?
  • [01:31:54.09] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, I like vegetables. I'm almost a vegetarian. See, like I said, I grew up on a farm. And you know, we raise all our food. All our food we've raised.
  • [01:32:11.42] Sugar-- we have sugar cane. And you grind the cane and it makes the sugar from the sugar cane. See, we didn't have to buy sugar.
  • [01:32:20.35] Flours-- flour. You know biscuit flour. You know how you do that? We grew the wheat and carried it to the mill. And that's where-- the flour come from wheat. So we had our flour.
  • [01:32:39.08] And we had our corn meal. When the corn got ripe, we carried it to the mill, and you grind it up. And you got the meal. And we didn't have to buy meat.
  • [01:32:50.89] SPEAKER 5: Did you milk the cows too?
  • [01:32:52.31] LOMAS SHAW: I milked the cow. We didn't have to buy milk because we milked the cow. We had cows. We got our milk. We got our butter from the cow's milk. And all of them were pure.
  • [01:33:07.73] It wasn't mixed like they got it mixed today. It was pure. Our pork-- you know, sausage, ham.
  • [01:33:18.20] We raised our hogs. And once a year-- well, in the wintertime, you kill your hogs. And you have enough meat to carry you to the next year.
  • [01:33:31.58] Chicken-- you didn't have to buy chicken. We grew up with our chicken. Didn't have to buy eggs.
  • [01:33:40.40] See, we had all everything we need to eat. Now my daddy didn't have no money, but he had love. He demonstrated his love to his children, his wife. So we raised all our food. We didn't have to buy nothing.
  • [01:33:59.24] SPEAKER 5: When y'all had the chickens, did they have the brown eggs or the white ones? Because I know sometimes, they be blue and pink too.
  • [01:34:05.01] LOMAS SHAW: Well, the dominant chicken produce brown eggs. But just regular chicken, white eggs. But them brown eggs, I always thought they were so good.
  • [01:34:19.61] And then we had guineas. That's a fowl. And a guinea laid eggs too, but I didn't like the guinea eggs.
  • [01:34:30.04] SPEAKER 5: What color were their eggs?
  • [01:34:32.24] LOMAS SHAW: They were small, white. They're real small.
  • [01:34:37.07] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:34:37.74] LOMAS SHAW: And they would-- See, now the hen, we had to make nests for them. They lay their eggs in the nest. But the guinea would go and find his nest, make his own nest. So you had to look and find where his nest would be. Yeah.
  • [01:35:01.27] And that guinea would fly like a bird. He would take off, but he'd always come back. And our pasture-- that's where the cows fed in this pasture.
  • [01:35:20.51] We had fence around it so they stay in a certain place. And we had ponds [INAUDIBLE] ponds. We had turtles.
  • [01:35:31.55] SPEAKER 5: Mm-hm.
  • [01:35:31.73] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah we had turtles. Had fish in those ponds. And we'd go to fishing and hunt for turtles in those ponds. Oh, when we was children, we had a good time. And I don't care what time of year, you'd have something that would grow out in the wild to eat.
  • [01:35:51.14] SPEAKER 5: Berries and stuff?
  • [01:35:52.59] LOMAS SHAW: Everything. I don't care what you want. Plum-- they grow on the side of a road. Peaches, beautiful peaches, sweet as I don't know what-- on the side of the rule. Apples, black berries, all of those things, the Lord prepares for the people to eat.
  • [01:36:15.02] And they didn't have to go hungry. And in the woods, they had what we'd call muscadine. Now, them muscadine was something like grapes, but they're larger than grapes. But they were sure enough good.
  • [01:36:29.72] SPEAKER 5: Did your mom used to make a lot of pies with the berries?
  • [01:36:31.81] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yes, she made apple pie, potato pies, which were one of the favorites, blue berry pie, all kind of pie. See, my mother was a cook for real. And we just enjoyed her cooking because she's a real cook.
  • [01:36:52.06] SPEAKER 5: Did you have like a dog or a cat on the farm or anything?
  • [01:36:55.04] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, we had dogs. We had rabbit dogs. That rabbit dog would run nothing but rabbits.
  • [01:37:02.88] You'd go hunting with rabbit dogs, because those rabbits be in the woods, and they'd be hiding where nobody could see them. But them dogs would know where to look for the rabbit. They'd jump him up. And the rabbit would take off and [INAUDIBLE] dog.
  • [01:37:20.28] And the dog may run them rabbit for 30 minutes or 40 minute before they catch him. He'll drive that rabbit-- now I don't care where you jump that rabbit. He gonna come back there if he can.
  • [01:37:36.42] He may go-- he may go a quarter of a mile around. But if you stay close to his den, that's where you find him. And when he'd come back, he'd be [INAUDIBLE]. And you shoot him, kill him. Yeah, that was a lot of fun.
  • [01:37:56.51] Them dogs-- man, they'd be barking like I don't know what. Running and barking, running and barking-- and sometimes, they catch them rabbit but not often. But more or less, you had to shoot them yourself.
  • [01:38:11.83] SPEAKER 5: Y'all had cats too?
  • [01:38:13.16] LOMAS SHAW: We had cats. We had cats. The cats stayed in the house.
  • [01:38:18.13] Cats stayed in the house. We just let them out during the days. But at night, they'd be in the house.
  • [01:38:28.61] And they loved to be around people, cats. They're very playful. We had horses too.
  • [01:38:38.59] SPEAKER 5: You used to ride them?
  • [01:38:40.25] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, I-- sure, that was our transportation. See, we had what we call buggies-- buggies. And the horse, they would pull the buggy.
  • [01:38:50.69] We had wagons. And the horse would pull the wagon. Now you got to have wood to keep warm.
  • [01:38:58.37] You had to go in them woods and get the wood, put it in the wagon, bring him back, bring the wood back, and pile it up beside the house. And you got your wood for the wintertime. And we used to pick cotton. You ever heard of cotton?
  • [01:39:15.75] SPEAKER 5: Mm-hm.
  • [01:39:16.80] LOMAS SHAW: We used to pick cotton. Yeah, we picked cotton. You make clothes.
  • [01:39:21.91] You gin the cotton to get the cotton seeds for the horses. They love the cotton seed. And the cows-- you get a seed to the cows and the horses. And you carry the cotton to the mill, and they make clothing out of cotton.
  • [01:39:44.59] SPEAKER 5: Your mom used to make y'all clothes?
  • [01:39:46.28] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah, she made most of our clothes. Yeah. Yeah, she made most of the clothes.
  • [01:39:57.01] So I like the country. I really like the country. And I still like the country. But now, at night, wasn't no lights out there--
  • [01:40:09.63] SPEAKER 5: You can see the stars real good, couldn't you?
  • [01:40:11.43] LOMAS SHAW: Oh man, it was [INAUDIBLE] dark, no kind of light. But the last 20 year, they start to put lights in the country, you know, because they're building new houses all out there in the woods. But before then, man, it was sure enough dark. I'm telling you the truth.
  • [01:40:39.39] SPEAKER 6: OK, when you rode horses, did you ride bareback, or did you ride saddle?
  • [01:40:43.45] LOMAS SHAW: No, bareback.
  • [01:40:46.69] SPEAKER 5: I rode a horse once--
  • [01:40:47.83] LOMAS SHAW: We didn't have the saddle horses.
  • [01:40:50.77] SPEAKER 6: I like bareback.
  • [01:40:53.06] SPEAKER 5: They poop when they walk. No, I rode one before, and my friend's horse was in front of me and just start pooping. I was like, oh, I didn't know they did that. But they're so pretty. They're real pretty.
  • [01:41:03.44] SPEAKER 4: I'm scared of them.
  • [01:41:04.99] SPEAKER 5: They're huge, but they're so pretty. What color horses did you have?
  • [01:41:08.71] LOMAS SHAW: Well, most of them were black horses.
  • [01:41:11.29] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:41:12.82] LOMAS SHAW: And now there's a difference between a horse and a mule.
  • [01:41:20.17] SPEAKER 5: That's when a donkey and a horse--
  • [01:41:21.23] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, right, right. Now we had mules. That's how they pulled the plow that we plowed the cotton with, the corn with it.
  • [01:41:33.52] You know, you got to work that. Once you plant the seed, corn and cotton seed, see, you have to work it. You have to work it because the grass will outgrow it, grow it.
  • [01:41:45.10] You won't have nothing but grass out there, weeds. So you got to work it at least once a month, at least once a month. Because most of the people work it twice a month, the cotton. Get that grass out of there because if you don't get the grass out, then the cotton won't produce. The grass will smother it out.
  • [01:42:12.76] SPEAKER 5: Is that why you like making flowers and stuff so much? Because you were on a farm?
  • [01:42:16.91] LOMAS SHAW: Well, yeah. Well, no-- when I was a little boy, I liked flowers. My mother was a flower person.
  • [01:42:24.43] She had flowers in the yard. And I like flowers, I guess, because of my mother liked flowers real good. And when I go to church now, it be hot down there in the summertime.
  • [01:42:40.83] I go to church. I always would get me a little flower bud to put on my lapel knowing as hot as it was, it would be withered before I got to church. But I still would get that little flower and put it on my lapel.
  • [01:42:58.60] Yep, sure would. [INAUDIBLE], yeah, I like country. I like country. yeah.
  • [01:43:06.95] SPEAKER 6: The country rocks.
  • [01:43:08.94] LOMAS SHAW: Huh?
  • [01:43:09.36] SPEAKER 6: I said the country's awesome.
  • [01:43:11.42] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, is it? You know-- have you been to the country?
  • [01:43:16.92] SPEAKER 6: We used to have a farm in Jackson.
  • [01:43:19.15] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, up in Jackson. OK, OK. Yeah, yeah. It's work. It requires work, now.
  • [01:43:26.44] SPEAKER 5: Does seem like it's fun, though--
  • [01:43:27.88] SPEAKER 6: --tractor. I had so much fun on our tractor. It was hilarious. Have you ever been canoeing?
  • [01:43:35.09] LOMAS SHAW: Huh?
  • [01:43:35.96] SPEAKER 6: Canoeing?
  • [01:43:37.23] LOMAS SHAW: No, I never.
  • [01:43:39.26] SPEAKER 5: You swim?
  • [01:43:39.83] LOMAS SHAW: What is that?
  • [01:43:41.90] SPEAKER 6: A boat [INAUDIBLE] like, Indians or Native Americans--
  • [01:43:46.52] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, oh, no. I rowed them. I rowed them, but-- [INAUDIBLE] the water. But I never did make one. Yeah.
  • [01:43:55.54] SPEAKER 6: They look fun.
  • [01:43:57.03] LOMAS SHAW: Uh huh.
  • [01:43:58.25] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE] people in canoe [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:44:03.15] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah.
  • [01:44:04.17] SPEAKER 5: Y'all used to swim in the lake or the pond?
  • [01:44:06.60] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah. See, we had a running stream of water, and we called it a branch. We had what you call a branch, and it had a creek and a river.
  • [01:44:17.34] See, the river was the largest. The creek was next, and the branch was the next. So we lived right on the branch.
  • [01:44:25.78] That was a stream of running water. Now a lot of fish was in there, and them fish would be good. We used to go [INAUDIBLE].
  • [01:44:34.80] We'd put a net across the branch, or the creek. And you have somebody go above the net with a [? hole. ?] And them fish would live in the water under the bank.
  • [01:44:50.58] And you had that net set down, oh, a good way from where you're going to start from. And you just keep on walking down. And them fish--
  • [01:45:00.68] SPEAKER 5: Yeah, get them in there?
  • [01:45:01.65] LOMAS SHAW: That's right. Them fish would get in that net. When you get there, you take that net up.
  • [01:45:07.20] You got the fish. You got sometime-- you get snake. Sometimes you have snakes in there.
  • [01:45:13.23] You have eels. Eels-- you ever know what a-- ever seen an eel? OK.
  • [01:45:19.08] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:45:19.68] LOMAS SHAW: Huh?
  • [01:45:20.09] SPEAKER 6: I said, those things are dangerous.
  • [01:45:22.59] SPEAKER 5: You didn't eat those, did you?
  • [01:45:23.95] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, we ate the eels.
  • [01:45:26.16] SPEAKER 5: I know you can. I'm just asking.
  • [01:45:28.34] SPEAKER 4: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:45:29.35] SPEAKER 6: What about-- did you ever dig for freshwater clams or oysters or whatever?
  • [01:45:33.57] LOMAS SHAW: No, I never did like that. For some reason, I never eat the clam or oyster.
  • [01:45:39.72] SPEAKER 5: What did eel taste like?
  • [01:45:42.45] LOMAS SHAW: Well, like a fish. It tastes like a fish. But you definitely had to cook it done. If it didn't, you know-- you just had to cook it slow and be sure it done. If you don't, when you go to eat it, blood eel come out of it.
  • [01:46:01.22] SPEAKER 5: Ew.
  • [01:46:01.95] SPEAKER 6: So basically, an eel is a [INAUDIBLE] you do not go in the fridge and grab an eel at the fridge. You grab a piece of fish or a bag of chips.
  • [01:46:12.43] SPEAKER 5: Why would a bag of chips be in the fridge, Cecilia?
  • [01:46:15.44] SPEAKER 6: I put chips in the fridge!
  • [01:46:17.74] SPEAKER 5: OK.
  • [01:46:21.42] SPEAKER 6: Oh, potato and just fry up some potatoes.
  • [01:46:24.81] SPEAKER 5: I was going to-- y'all didn't make French fries, did y'all?
  • [01:46:27.71] LOMAS SHAW: Huh
  • [01:46:28.08] SPEAKER 5: Did you make French fries or no?
  • [01:46:29.90] LOMAS SHAW: Oh, yeah.
  • [01:46:30.66] SPEAKER 5: OK.
  • [01:46:30.99] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah we had French fries and sweet potato, too.
  • [01:46:35.31] SPEAKER 5: Oh yeah, my momma make sweet potato fries sometimes.
  • [01:46:37.71] LOMAS SHAW: See, in the winter time-- well, in the fall of the year, to save those potatoes through the winter months, you make a bank and put them-- put the potatoes in the bank. So the frogs won't bite them. And they'll rot if frogs get to them. And then during the winter months, you go in there, get as many potatoes you know, and they'll last all the way to summertime.
  • [01:47:06.74] SPEAKER 5: Y'all used to make popcorn over the stove?
  • [01:47:08.28] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yes. [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:47:09.98] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:47:10.54] LOMAS SHAW: We raised popcorn, you know.
  • [01:47:12.33] SPEAKER 5: Mm-hm.
  • [01:47:12.72] LOMAS SHAW: Yeah, we grew popcorn. That was one of our main source of food, popcorn.
  • [01:47:20.58] SPEAKER 6: Does your family still own the farm today? The land?
  • [01:47:24.33] LOMAS SHAW: No, no, no, no, none of my relatives. Matter of fact, all of my sisters and brothers deceased. It was 12.
  • [01:47:35.11] I'm the only one that's living. The rest of them deceased.
  • [01:47:40.97] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:47:42.85] LOMAS SHAW: Huh?
  • [01:47:44.72] SPEAKER 6: I only have one brother and one sister. That's a lot of siblings.
  • [01:47:48.48] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah, 12. But just-- you have so much fun. We get out there in the field and work it. And it would be hot, now. But we still be out there, enjoying it, singing, playing, telling jokes.
  • [01:48:03.39] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE] back. [INAUDIBLE] do that.
  • [01:48:08.04] LOMAS SHAW: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:48:08.45] SPEAKER 5: Y'all catch fireflies?
  • [01:48:09.70] LOMAS SHAW: Huh?
  • [01:48:10.28] SPEAKER 5: Y'all used to catch fireflies?
  • [01:48:11.68] SPEAKER 6: [INAUDIBLE]
  • [01:48:13.39] LOMAS SHAW: What you call them?
  • [01:48:14.43] SPEAKER 5: Fireflies? The little bugs that light up?
  • [01:48:16.53] LOMAS SHAW: Oh yeah, we called them lightning bugs. Oh yeah, yeah, man. Plenty lightning bugs. Why, I have lightning bugs around my house. You do too, don't you?
  • [01:48:26.88] SPEAKER 5: Yeah, sometimes.
  • [01:48:28.09] LOMAS SHAW: Mm-hm, yeah, there's a lot of them.
  • [01:48:29.23] SPEAKER 6: I do, but my street always dark.
  • [01:48:35.52] SPEAKER 5: We only have four minutes of tape left, so I guess that's it.
  • [01:48:38.64] LOMAS SHAW: OK, that's it?
  • [01:48:39.45] SPEAKER 5: Yeah.
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2020

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Subjects
Friendship College
Streetcars
Buses
Gardens & Gardening
Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church [Detroit]
LOH Employment
LOH Employment - Health Ed Public
Oral Histories
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Lomas Shaw
Greenville SC
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