Evening star. [volume], December 06, 1931, Page 4, Image 88

About Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972

Image provided by: Library of Congress, Washington, DC

                
Old Uncle Mose;
WHENEVER I see uncle Mose
Dunccn I marve) at his peace
of mind, at his faith in his
Maker, at his amazing memory.
Uncle Mose is the oldest per
son I know, one of the poorest
in this world's goods, one of the strongest,
healthiest and hcppiest.
He says he was 39 years old when he went
■with his white master to war in 1861. Maybe
he was, for the oldest citizens here agree that
when they were children, Uncle Mose looked
ks old as he does now. But for all his years
his black, velvety skin is unlined, and hardly a
thread of white show's In his thick shock of
wool.
When the war was over and he was a free
man he took up well digging for a living while
his younger brother, Sam. ran for the State
Senate and defeated his opponent, a prominent
White man. by a large majority.
Uncle Mose thinks Sam made a bad mis
take when he took up with carpet baggers and
former slaves who were drunk with freedom,
but he tells with pride fcow Sam was offered a
fine plantation to cast his vote for a measure
that threatened hardship for the white people,
and refused because he had white friends at
home.
This is true. When Sam’s term in office
ended somewhat abruptly and he came home
he was given title to a small piece of land.
The rest of his life he lived in a cabin at the
top of the steep, br: ken hillside and plowed
his brindle ox. trying to Kill the joint grass in
patches of cotton and com that struggled for
life between rain-washed gullies.
Sam liked to laugh over some of his ex
periences in the State Capitol at Columbia,
but the only material things he had left to show
for them wrere his Prince Albert coat and black
derby hat. He wore them to church and to
the village every Saturday during the 50 years
he lived afterward, and when death took his
soul to the green fie’ds of Eden his old body
wore them to its grave.
Everybody called Sam "Senator,” and every
body respected him, for he was honest, in
dustrious, sober and courteous, a good citizen
so long as life lasted.
He and Uncle Mose learned to read and
write when they were boys, along with chil
dren of their white master. Today Uncle Mose
can repeat the multiplication table from twice
two-are-four up to the twelve-times-a-hundred
so glibly his thick loose lips move like a
shuttle in a loom between his sparse black
mustache and beard.
He can start with b-a, ba, b-e be, b-i bi and
recite the whole old blue-black speller without
halting. He can name without hesitation every
President and Vice President freon George
Washington to Hoover, tell where they came
from, how long they served.
HE lives alone in a tiny cabin, does bis own
cooking and housekeeping. The younger
Negroes laugh at him, "make sport," as he calls
it, when he tries to set them right, but it
rarely disturbs him. When he wants a sym
pathetic listener or a change of food he visits
some of his white neighbors.
His legs are short, his body heavy, his feet
bare, but he can "take his foot in his hand”
and walk five miles or ten and arrive without
a sign of fatigue.
He sits patiently on the back door step and
waits until the spirit moves one of the servants
to announce him. They resent him and he
knows it. He sighs over their lack of manners
and says times have changed since he was
young. The cook complains that he eats too
much—as much as three men could hold.
Uncle Mose answers that he has lived as long
as three men, done as much work, seen as
much, and three times as much food is his
due. Some of the other servants hold that he
wearies them out, telling them how to act.
Uncle Mosc says he despises unmannerable
people worse than anything in the world, and
reminds them that once God sent bears to
eat up children who made sport of a wise old
man. They had better be careful.
His old features are built so they cannot
register sorrow. The only sign he gives of
worryation is shaking his head. Lately I saw
hi* head shaking so earnestly I asked what
was wrong. Uncle Mose said sorrowfully that
Satan would get all his people if they did not
change their ways. They had forgotten God,
thought only of pleasuring themselves, dressing
up, acting big doings. Most of them were bad
as Belshazzer ever was. Only last Sunday—it
was convention Sunday, too, and the church
was so crowded with delegates some had to
stand outside in the yard—the deacons let a
man fetch a barrel of com liquor and sell it
to delegates and members. They got drunk,
had a fight, the sheriff came all the way from
town and carried two truck loads to Jail. What
did Jesus think of that?
If the people did not quit their doings, God
would lose patience and 6end a curse on them
worse than the curse he put on Ham. Black
people are under Ham's curse to this day. God
has them marked. They had better watch out
what they do.
Ham was a lot like the young people now.
God let him go in the ark and be saved be
cause Noah, his daddy, was a good Christian
man. The angel sealed the ark up and took
the key off. Rain came, flooded the rivers,
covered the land, drowned everything in the
world. The ark rode the waters until the sun
came out. After that little dove came back
with an olive branch in his bill the angel un
locked the ark and came in. He had a t-aik
with Noah and told him the land was full of
dead folks. Noah would have to bury every one
six feet deep, for the living cannot stay among
the dead.
IT was a big work. Noah got so down in the
' heart he went back in the pantry room and
drank up all the sacrament wine he had on
board. It was old wine and mighty strong. He
got drunk and lay down on the floor. His wife
tried to make him get up but he rolled and
carried on until his breeches came off. Ham
laughed. That was ryrong. Ham ought to have
Painted for The Star’s Sunday Magazine by Lu Klmmel.
Hr can start with b-a, ba, b-e, be, h*t, bi and recite the whole of the old speller
without halting.
By Julia Peterkin
Author of “Scarlet Sister Mary," “Black April," “Green
Thursday" and Other Novels.
had respect for his daddy. One of the other
boys got a sheet and covered Noah up.
When the angel told God about It, God sent
the angel back to get Ham and take him off
to a far country where the hot sun was so
strong it turned him black. All Ham’s chil
dren and grandchildren, all his people are black
to this day. Noah was not white or black,
but the color of the ground, same like Adam
and Eve.
Ham’s brothers helped Noah bury the dead
and God gave them good places to live, but the
boy who covered Noah with the sheet got the
best place of all. He lived where it was cool
and shady and his children and grandchildren
got whiter and whiter, for the land was rich
and plenty of fruit grew on the trees. All they
had to cook was meat.
Before long his family multiplied until they
needed more land. Plenty of land was there, but
they wanted good level fields. Christopher Co
lumbus was a young widow man then and full
of spirit. He saw the need, so he made a boat
from a picture of Noah’s ark. Building the
boat took all his money and he had to have
some to pay his sailors.
All the countries around him were under
king and queen rule. He went to the kings to
get help, but they were busy, so he went to
the Queens, Elizabeth in England, and Joanna
and Catherine. They would not give him a
cent. Isabel in Spain liked Columbus and sold
her jewelry to raise a thousand dollars for him.
Columbus fixed up two other ships and sailed
off. He sailed and sailed until he came to an
island named Cuba. 700 miles long and two
mm -w-s* .—»
miles wide. Prom there he went to Florida
and scoured the country until he reached St.
Augustine, which is the oldest town in the
world.
Indians were in this country then, but people
came over by the millions and ran the Indians
off and took the land for themselves. All these
people were put under the King and Queen
law. It’s a hard law, too. That was a hundred
years before George Washington was bom.
Washington was bom in Virginia and he was
a smart man. He fought England on the
fourth of March and whipped them on the
twelfth of July, got his people from under the
King and Queen law. They were so glad they
made a merry day for him, and had a big bar
beque and elected him President and called the
barbeque grounds Washington, after him.
From then on everybody got on fine until
Abraham Lincoln grew up. Lincoln was born
in Kentucky in a log cabin. He was a poor
white-trash boy and had to work all day to get
money to go to school at night. After he
learned to read and write he studied how to
be a lawyer, a Congressman, a Senator, he even
studied how to be President. When he learned
all he could he went to Tennessee and was
elected high sheriff. Later in Springfield he
was elected to the high Senate.
The people up there were not bredded people
like those in the South. They did field work
and worked at all kinds of trades. They were
jealous hearted of the people in the South, who
were bredded and rich, and they asked Lincoln
to run for President and make the South people
get out and work.
ban wore his Prince Albert coat anti black derby hat to church and to the
village jor 50 years.
'A! ' - f.
When the South heard that they called oat
Jefferson Davis and told him something had to
be done about it. They could not live in a
country with a man like Lincoln as President.
Davis came from a high class and never did
run with common folks. He went to Richmond
and built a capital and manufactured plenty
of money. A black field hand in the South
could make as much as four hundred dollars in
three months in those days. Hard times seemed
gone for good. Maybe people pleasured so much
they forgot to pray. Anyway, the North people
got vexeder than ever and called out Lincoln.
Lincoln said the best way was to fight it out,
whoever was whipped would lose all the money.
He rounded up all the white trash and sent
them South. They fought the South four years.
Burned the houses, stole the silver, carried off
the horses and freed the slaves. They had
plenty of their own money but it was no good
to buy things. It was a sad time. The South
has not gotten straight to this day. Money
has been scarce ever since.
HOW about slavery, Uncle Moses, I suggested;
Weren’t the slaves glad to be free?
Not me, Miss. I never dug a well in my
life until after freedom. I was de pantry boy,
wid plenty to eat, plenty to drink, not a lash
on my back lessen I forgot my manners and
took too much after de gentlemen had finished
drinkin’ dey drams.
He says the North started slavery. They went
to Africa and brought shiploads of*black peo
ple from the land where God put Ham. The
weather was too cold, the slaves died like
files. Those that were left were sent South and
sold. The North people did all that. Thank
God they did. Cold w'eather is a hard thing
in this world. Ham’s children had a bad
enough curse on them already, without being
frozen to death. Ham did a terrible thing when
he laughed at his pa. God says children must
honor their parents and God will bear down
on anybody right today for disrespect to old
folks. Satan Is to blame. Satan wants hell
piled up with people.
It is a pity God let Satan loose on the
world, Uncle Mose, I put in.
It does look so, but God never aimed to do
It. A long time ago before the world was made
God sat up by himself in the middle of the
air. He was the Father, Son and Holy Ghost
all in one, but He got lonesome with nobody
to talk to, so He built a fine heaven, made a
gold throne to sit on, and next to it He put
a gold chair and made an angel named Luci
fer to sit beside Him and talk. Before long
God made the earth and people just for some
thing to do, and Lucifer helped him smart
as could be.
Lucifer was the star of heaven, for Jesus was
not bom then, but he got uppity and sassy.
God kicked him clean out of heaven into the
middle of the earth. Lucifer fell so fast his
wings caught fire and burnt off.
That same fire started hell, and it is seven
times hotter than fire on earth. Before the peo
ple on earth could use it, God made an angel
take a piece and swim it through seven rivers
to cool it down enough to cook with.
When Lucifer left heaven God changed his
name to Satan, but He could not make him
stand still and behave. Every time God looked
off Satan slipped up to the top of the earth and
started wars and deviltry. He is at it strong as
ever, yes, Lord.
XT i COiUCUt J.J.KSK/ y Cl WtttCJ. CXJ. lie VClrVCM
break his knee joints regular or Satan will
wipe this country clean off the earth. Satan is
the very one started all these airplanes. Th*
Bible says people must keep out of the elements,
says it plain as day.
It is a pity God let the Republicans multiply
so fast. Now since they rule the land, look at
the price of cotton, look at the bad liquor, look
how everything is changed. Even the sun
does not shine so bright and the skies are not
near so blue. No Lord, times have changed.
But wait. Things might get better. No tell
ing. God will never turn His face clean away
from high class, bredded people. It would be no
surprise if the South would start manufacturing
money again like they used to. Plenty of smart
men are left here yet. Plenty. They got better
sense than to make airplanes and things to kill
they-selves. They make cotton to clothe the
people and com to feed them and raise hogs
and cattle.
That’s the way to live. The Republicans will
soon thin themselves out. It will be a blessing,
too. We’ll have a good country to live in then.
Plenty of money, plenty to wear, plenty to eat.
Some of these days we’ll tell hard times good
by if we don’t forget God and Jesus.
H aste “Gas”Now Saved
ENOUGH natural gasoline, which formerly
went to waste, was produced last year to
drive a "15-mile-to-the-gallcn automobile” more
than 30,000,000,000 miles. At that, production
was below that of 1929.
The natural gasoline comes from two sources,
the primary source being from the oil wells
during the production and processing of crude
oils. The secondary source is from natural
gas wells. Last year's production was nearly
two and a quarter billion gallons, dropping
off somewhat from the previous year due to the
decline in production of crude oils. The greater
demand for natural gas, however, because of
the construction of the huge pipe lines from
the Texas Panhandle, increased this source of
supply and overcome to a large extent the loss
from the curtailing of petroleum production.
The United States produces about 91 per
cent of the world’s supply of natural gasoline,
but the other producing countries are showing
gains every year.
Oil Sales, $17,000,000
IT required 970 filling stations to supply the
I wants of the motorists of Maryland last year,
these stations doing a total business of more
than $17,000,000.