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SAMUEL PROCTOR ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM at
the University of Florida
Lum 123AB
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
-:MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER BRENDA BROOKS
DATE: MARCH 27, 1973
TAPE: ONE
SIDE: ONE
PAGE: ONE
B: Today is March 27, 1973, in the home of Dr. Fuller Lowry, and in
this conversation will be Mr. Peter Brooks, andArenda Brooks ask-
ing questions, but mainly listening to two who have witnessed much
of the forming of the history of the Indians of Robeson County.
Bf. O.k.,just start where ever you like.
P: Well, I'll go...going back to just what we were speaking about, the
Oxendine family, and the Lowry family, and the Brooks family to
uh, introduce to Mr...to you Mr. Lowry my people for a record for
myself.
L: Yeah, I see.
P: Uh, there's Mr. Billy Oxendine, Mr. Allonzo Oxendine, and Melvinj
Oxendine, and Mr. Jody Oxendine, and Mr. Saul Oxendine who was their
father, who was also Sandy Brooks's father.xfou remember I told you....
B: Saul Oxendine, now was Sandy Brooks's father, and Sandy Brooks is
your father.
P: Yeah..Sandy Brooks is my father, born out of wedlock to Middy Brooks,-..
L, -4nd was reared in the Lowry family over near what is now Ellroy.
9: Yeah, Hopewell sec...
)_P: Was sent to Lowry in the Hopewell section.
T,--- -
SUBJECT: FULLER LOWRY
PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: That's correct.
P: He...he uh, grew up over there with the Lowry boys, same as one
of the brothers.
L: That's right.
B: How did he .why did he end up with the Lowry$ rearing him? You
can probably remember him very well.
L: Yeah, I remember Mr. Sandy Brooks well, I'd see him around there,
I didn't know but what him and Uncle Sinclair was brothers. One why,
because they were together all the time you knowiiwen I was a young
man they...brother Brooks was always around, and I just considered
him one of the Lowry boys.
B: And what....
L: An him and Uncle Sinclair were great cronies, you know.
B: Well how do you think what do you think accounts for him ending
up with the pwrys though? What can you tie this relationship for
me?
L: Well that s, was uh, in connection with his mother and father.
They had some relation there with Uncle Sinclair. His...what was
uh, his mother's name?
P: His grandmother's...uh...Middy.
L: Middy?
P: Middy...and Middy was the mother of uh...Patty Lowry.
L: Patty Lowry.
P: Who was Patty Brooks after she married John Brooks.
2
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: Patty Lowry is a close relative to Sinclair Lowry, and the Lowry
family. That is the same Lowrys as Sinclair Lowry. ,Patty Lowry
was. And that made the connection, and why that uh, Sandy Brooks
grew up with these boys. They were close relatives.
B: Now did I follow that right? Patty Lowry is the daughter of Middy?
P: No.
c-
B: Vi.e versa?
P: Vife versa, Sandy Brooks is the son of Middy, anand Middy was
the daughter of Patty.
L: Patty Lowry.
P: And John Brooks.
B: Uh huh.
L: Patty Lowry married John Brooks, that's right.
P: That's right.
B: Right.
P: Thatta right.
L: And this was their daughter.
B: O.k.
P: Uh....I'd like to connect now...I'd like to get another ..-.veri-
fication from you on this fact. That uh, Sandy Brooks married the
daughter of Arlin Hunt.
L: Yes, I remember that Jack, that he married the daughter of Arlin
Hunt. Arlin Hunt lived over in South Carolina at that time did he
not?
3
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: Right on the...right on the state line.
L: Right on the state line.
P: It was always known as the state line. And to that union there was
fourteen children born.
L: Fourteen.
P: Yeah...uh, eight boys and six girls.
B: Give me the names if you can of those.
L: Name the eight boys now.
P: Uh, the oldest boy was named Arlin...James Arlin, after his grand-
father.
L: Yeah.
P: And Raymond Brooks, Ed Brooks, Andy Brooks, Sandy Brooks, Johnny
Brooks, Peter Brooks, who is myself, and Joseph Brooks.
L: I knew all t ese boys, we...all along, I knew...I knew them from
Arlin Brooks on down. -
P: And the girls...the girls of this family was Mary Liza Brooks.
L: Who did Mary Liza marry now?
P: Who...who...who married Chester Locklear.
L: Chester Locklear.
P: Chester Locklear was the son of Mac Locklear and Agie Nora.
L: And he lived over here at St. Anna.
P: Yeah, he lived at St. Anna for a long time. Betty was the second
youngest daughter, and she married Allen Hunt, who wasthe son of
Joe Hunt, and I don't remember here.his wife's name right at the
present time. But I believe, let me see, I believe that it was
4
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...Martha.
L: Now you mean Joe Hunt was uh...?
P: The father of Allen Hunt.
L: Oh, Allen Hunt. Allen Hunt was the man that bought the Baker place?
P: That...that's correct.
L: Well Joe Hunt...when I used to pass through old Dogwood Church,
as I remember, he's one of the members of #he old Dogwood Church.
P: That's right.
L: Old Bethel Church....
B: And where is that...where was Bethel located?
L: Bethel is located uh, on Ash Pole Swamp, just uh, say uh, northeast
from Roland, about two miles, maybe two and a half miles.
P: Yeah, maybe three miles.
L: There's a school down there known as Ash Pole Center, and uh, Bethel
was just down a little east of Ash Pole Center School. About a mile
I'd say.
P: Yeah.
B: Is the church still there today? Is that old church...?
L: No, they tore down the church, and moved it and built a church at
the school house. And after they moved the church, Bethel Church,
to the school house, it...it's known as Ash Pole Center now, but
the Baptists came in and built another church there on the grounds.
B: Now is this that nice white wood church across from the school?
L: Yes.
5
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: Do Indians attend that church? Is...that is an Indian church?
L: Yes, I think a Mr. Allen Hunt was the leader in establishing
that church. As I understand, he.-.-he--u put up most of the money.
P: I understand that too, yeah, that agrees. Uh, we want to say too
that previous to all this, there was also a school at Dogwood.
L: Yeah.
P: Yeah.
L: I taught school at Dogwood.
P: Yeah.
L: In the little huase just on the hill from the church.
P: By the way, that's the first school I attended. And I started there
when I was five years old, and I was born in 19fl-, April the fourth,
April the twenty-...April the twenty-ninth, 1902.
B: Who was your first teacher?
P: My first teacher was uh, Miss Morilla Chavis. Mister...uh...a sister
of Reverend Z.R. Chavis, and Reverend George Chavis.
B: How many...
L: Miss Morilla was a classmate of mine up at the old college at Pates.
She was uh, one of the best english students in the school.
B: How many students went to this school at Bethel when you taught
there? About how many Indian students?
L: About uh...fifty, fifty to sixty.
B: And how many grade levels did you have? What...?
L: We had uh...about...we had ten grades.
6
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: Was it all in one room, or did you have...?
L: In one room. Just one teacher. We'd have ten...ten grades.
B: Did you go to school every day...I mean five days a week for how,
how many months of the year? Or...?
L: Well, we have a...usually have a summer school six weeks, and the
winter school san-three months.
P: Uh huh.. three months.
B: And then...because most of the people had to be at home working on
the farm?
L: And for the lack of money. The state didn't appropriate, back then,
as much money as they do now. They could only appropriate money
enough to run a certain length of time.
B: What kind of distances did these students have to walk to get to
school some of them?
L: Anywhere from four miles to a half a mile.
B: And some of them were five...
L: three or four miles away.
B: Five years old, walking that distance to school?
L: I was six years old, and I walked three and a half miles.
P: Yeah.
B: One way?
L: One way.
P: I'd like to say too that uh, the next school I attended at this...
this particular school house, Mr. Breck Sampson was teaching at
7
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...that time, and I being a young fellow, and not knowing who to
expect after having a lady teacher for my first teacher, when I
saw him coming, I got scared to death, and went to crying.
L: I've seen....
B: Were you a student along with Mr. Breck Sampson, was he in school
up at the old Hope School?
L: At Hope School. And he was there...after I graduated there, I
taught school there a year, and he went to school, he was a student
of mine. We were in school together, and then later on he was a
student of mine for one year...
B: I...
L: Ict-cvw n t-
B: I've uh, heard that when you finish school at the old normal school
this was part of-the condition that you got to go to school, that
you would commit yourself to teach at least a year after you
finish. Is this what happened to you, the reason you taught at the
old norma school.
L: No, that...that wasn't in existence then...that's a new law since
then. That was uh...wasn't connected to that school at Pates. That
was connected to the school later on, after it came to Pembroke.
B: Uh, other family connections, there's a lot of them I want to talk
to you about, because I'm interested in you talking some about
your family geneology, just the Lowry side of it, after he gets all
the connections here with the Brookses he can recall.
P: Uh...I had always heard about, uh, the old man, John Brooks, who
8
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...was my great grandfather, but here of late...well, I understood
this more fully in the year 1933. But in the year 1967 I found out
for sure that somewhere he had a war record, and I've been trying
to locate, and I'm still trying to get a little more evidence and
advice from the War Department on his-ten-years service. And this
uh, particular John Brooks had a grant for a piece of land. He also
had a pension, and he was a soldier in the revolutionary war, and
for this reason I'm still waiting for some more evidence that we've
wrote back for concerning his warrant...warrant number under his
soldiers, and his warrant number under his grant for a piece of
land. There's a little footnote there that said to write those
numbers for further information about...about the whereabouts of
the land that we haven't received yet. But an aunt of mine who is
a very truthful woman, uh, give me to understand that by two or
three hearsayers... (telephone)
Yes, I was just speaking about my great grandfather's service in
the Revolutionary war.
B: Can I read this letter to confirm that. I don't know if you've
ever seen this...this before, or maybe you would read it for me,
I'd like to have it in your voice if you can read that for me. Can
you see it alright?
r~ P: I want to say a few more things about this.
B: While he's reading it, you can go ahead and...
L: Uh, you want me to read this out loud?
9
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: Yes, I'd like to have that on tape in your voice.
L: Mr. Joseph Brooks, Pembroke, North Carolina. Dear sir: reference
is made to your personal request of this date, for the record of
John Brooks, a soldier of the Revolutionary War. Uh, this data
furnished here in are obtained from the reports on file in the
Revolutionary War Pension Claim S6722. Based upon the military
service of John Brooks in that war. The date and place of birth of
John Brooks are not stated. While residing in Bladen, that part
which was later on Robeson County, North Carolina, he enlisted,
date not given, and served -a- 4Prousa at various times on tours
of from three to six months, such as a private under Captain
Alexander McNeil. Gibson, and uh Hadley, and Col. Riggen Bridge.
Let me see...Col. Riggen in the North Carolina Troups. He was in
an engagement at uh...
P: Betty's Bridge.
L: Betty's Bridge, and in this battle of Camden, where he and Captain
Gibson, under whom he was then serving, were captured, /aken to
St. 4iustine, and held for about four months. He was discharged
about the close of the war, having served between three and four
years in all. It was stated that all of his service was rendered
v +A t Ca ff country. John Brooks was allowed pension in
his application, ezecat ediay. executed May the twentieth 1882.
P: '83.
L: 18...18...is that '82?
P: '83.
10
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: 1883...at which time he was about ninety-five, or ninety-six years
of age, and resided in Robeson County, North Carolina. That looks
like...just a minute...it looks like 1853. Let's get...
B: That's correct, 1853.
P: Yeah, 1853.
L: Yeah, 1853. Uh, back for correction. John Brooks was allowed pension
in his application, executed May the thirtieth, 1853.
P: That's correct.
L: At which time he was about ninety-five or ninety-six years of age,
and resided in Robeson County, North Carolina. He was also allowed
one hundred and sixty acres of land in warrant number 80080.:For-the
location of the land you should apply to the Commissioner of the
General Land Office, Interior Department, this city, citing the
following warrant number, 80030-150-55...fifty-five. In 1865, the
soldier was residing in Johnson, formerly Bladen County, North
Carolina. Now I'd like to say that in getting up the statistics for
my address in Raleigh, in the change of the name of the church from
Cherokee to Lumbee, we used this uh, man's name, John Brooks, and
recited the fact that he was a soldier in the Revolutionary War,
and that he received a grant of a hundred and fifty acres, known
as Bounty Land, for his service in the Revolutionary War. And that
was stated several times in our campaigning for the Lumbee name.
B: This uh, grant of land was granted by the King of England, is that
correct, George the Third, I've read. Is that...do you know?
11
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER. BRENDA BROOKS
L: I'm not sure about that, but uh, it was granted by the government,
you know after the Revolutionary War. It must have been from them
because they owned this country, you know.
B: And you wanted to supplement that now, concerning John Brooks and
this Revolutionary service?
P: I just wanted to say that this John Brooks married Patty Lowry,--ho
became Patty Brooks, and we have here in our possession, as we...on
the behalf of this aunt that I spoke of previously, Aunt Matilda
Locklear. I went to see her one night, whenever I was planning to
write something for my children, to leave for my children, perhaps
fifteen, eighteen years ago. And whenever I got to talking with her,
and was questioning about some of the...to know where this particular
man came from, she wasn't able to tell me. And the only thing she
did tell me was, that they said he come from St. gustine. So this
affadavit clears up the feetr-tha fact by saying that he was
captured/and taken to St. Ugustine, and was there for something
like four months until the war closed, and then he was brought back
and was discharged. And of course she didn't know all this, she
just thought that he probably come from England or someplace, and
came there by boat, instead of being captured out of this war that
we're speaking about. Now this...ti man John Brooks, the way I
figure it out, uh being ninety-five years of age in 1853, if you
subtract that ninety-five from 1853, you arrive at the figure2
1758 would have been his birth date. And he was either born here
12
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...in--Wt,-.in this location, in Robeson County, and if we can't
find him here, and whenever we get more infL.r..information about
him, I believe we'll have to look elsewhere, and perhaps it'll be
in England. Because England at that time owned Scotland, Ireland,
and miles, and I've been told by some friends that I made in
Florida once, that Brooks was a Scotch name, and they A pretty
sure that some of my ancestors come from Scotland.
B: Now this uh, John Brooks married Patty Lowry?
P: Patty Lowry.
B: And here, I have an old letter...now how is this person, is this
Polly or Patty...I wondered if she forgot to...
P: No, that's...that's Polly...that's Polly.
L: And was Sandy Brooks the daughter of Patty and John Brooks?
P: That's correct.
L: O.k.
P: No...no, he's the...he's the...he's the son of their daughter, Middy.
L: Of their daughter?
P: Middy.
L: Yeah, we wanted to get that straight.
P: And I...and I...
L: He was the son of their daughter Middy...
P: Yeah.
L: Middy was the daughter, that is, John Brooks married Patty Lowry,
and they had a daughter named Middy, and she had...
13
SUBJECT: PD. Ffh1RBkW
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: A son?
L: A son...
B: Sandy?
L: Named Sandy born out of 'en-..wedlock, who's father was...
B: Oxendine?
L: What's his name?
B: Alvie?
L: No...uh...uh
B: I thought this was .....
P: I have it right here
L: And there's no doubt then that Patty Lowry was some of the family
of Allen Lowry, the father of Henry Bear.2
B: Here...here's some of it right here.
P: Just a minute, that's not it.
B: Was it this Alph Oxendine, in the Chapel area you were referring
to earlier?
ko.A Ats-
L: I was well aquainted with Mr. A&iae Oxendine, because I taught
school at Chapel for two or three years, and uh, I went to his home
very often. He had a large family of boys, and I knew the entire
family. He had an outstanding family in the Chapel community was
Lonzie Oxendine's family.
B: And is that the father of Lockie Oxendine?
L: Yes.
P: Yeah...
B: Alphonso Oxendine is the father of Lockie Oxendine?
14
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: Yes.
P: Let atef you this too. Uh, Lhokl. et a. .Lockie is also the
father of Henry Ward Oxendine who has recently been named to the
State House as our latest...
L: Representative.
P: As our representative from this district.
B: As the first Indian?
L: Yeah, the first...no...he's not the first...
B: The first Indian to serve in the House of Representatives?
L: The second. There was an Oxendine away back yonder when they first
organized. Name...I believe his name was Jim Oxendine. And I think
he was the father of Oscar Sampson's wife. When they first organized
the legislature at Raleigh, uh, Jim Oxendine was elected represent-
ative, and he was the first of our people. It wasgim-Oxendine...uh,
lived on the farm, this side of Harper's Ferry, where Oscar Sampson's
widow died recently. That was his home.
B: And was Mr....
L: You've heard that haven't you?
P: Yeah...I didn't know all aBat-4e, but I know the...I know part of
what you said about Mr.Oscar.
L: Yeah. Well he was a representative at Raleigh when they first org-
anized.
B: And was he elected by vote of the people like we do now? I mean this
is when the legislature was set up?
L: Yeah.
15
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: He was elected by a popular vote?
L: By the votes of the people...yeah. So Mr. Oxendine at present was
appointed. Uh, he succeeded the uh, late uh...
B: Frank...Frank White.
L: Yeah, the late Frank White. He was appointed to take his place.
B: I wanted you to get down and get to the connection of this letter.
It seems like this is a family that left here, and she was writing
back to her father.
P: That's a...that's a man...this letter that we are kind of squabbling
about here was just one that I happened to find in the Bible that
my aunt Matilda gave me the night that I went there st..for some
information. She says, "Why son," She says, "I've got an old Bible
here." And whenever I begti to look at it, and admired it so much,
she says, "well I'll give it to you." So I've had it in my possessions
now for about eighteen years, and it-a...it's a real gem. I'm going
to have Miss Brenda to tell you something more about the Bible,
when it was dated and so forth.
B: The Old and New Testament translated out of the original tomes, and
with the former translation diligently Pppared and revised, =
stereotype edition, uh, for the American Bible Society in 1829.
And in it is written some of the birth records of Indians, as well
as some of the death records, including a letter that was written
by a family that it seems had moved to some of the turpentine fields,
or turpentine woods in Georgia, and it sounds like she is writing
16
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: Xack to her father. But the English she uses is really interesting,
it reminds me of the old English, the way she has spelled some of
the words, and it's surprising that this woman...is this Polly
Lowry...is that the person writing it...it looks like...?
P: No, that's uh...
B: It looks like PaNft but I can't say...what is that?
P: Yeah, that...that's...that's right.
B: Is that Pai4e?
P: That's a-8e.
B: Pa44e Lowry.
L: She meant...she put it Pollie?
B: Yes, but many of the words spelled in this letter sometimes have
the "e" ending, and it just...it's so similar to what I learned in
the contemporary high schools as old English. This is what's so
amazing to me, and the letter is dated January 27, 1901. And she
has written January, and t-h-e, 27, 9..19001. So this is, she knew
what she wanted to say, but the way that it's written is really
interesting. And then she addresses it to her father, who is Mr.
Alvie...
P: Alvie Oxendine.
B: And it's written from the Georgia...what is the name of that turp-
entine company, can you read that to me?
P: jowell Turpentine.
B: In...what is this?
17
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: In care of...in other words, she was giving her address, and...and
asked that they write...
B: In care of this man?
P: Yeah.
B: Ray Mills?
P: Ray Mills, Georgia, uh, Powell Turpentine Company.
L: I knew Mr. Alvie Oxendine, I boarded at his home when I taught school
in Chapel.
B: Well tell us something about...about him, while he's...have you found
your correct name? Now give me the geneology again...who was this?
P: Uh, this fellow that we were talking about a few minutes ago, Mr.
Henry Ward Oxendine, who has recently been appointed...been appointed
to take...to fill the vacancy of a fellow that died, Mr. Frank
White. Uh, he is the grgndson...he's the...his father is the...
B: Whose name is...if you'll give the name...you might give to her.
P: Whose father's name is Lockie...Lockie Oxendine...
L: Lonzie Oxendine's son.
P: Lonzie Oxendine's son, and Saul Oxendine was Lonzie Oxendines father.
B: And Saul...
L: Solomon...you knew his name was Solomon?
P: No, this is just Saul.
L: Saul Oxendine.
P: Now Saul...the Solomon that you're talking about was one of Lonzie's
18
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...boys.
L: Lonzie's boys, you're right.
P: Yeah.
B: So now this Saul Oxendine is also supposedly the father of Sandy?
P: Sandy Brooks.
B: O.k. this is the connection we were trying to make here.
P: Yeah, I've already explained that Sandy Brooks was born out of wed-
lock. And therefore he had a right, a perfect right to take his
mother's name...who was Middy Brooks.
B: And then, were there other children born to Middy Brooks?
P: Oh yes...oh yes, there was several children born. Now I don't...I
wasn't living at that time, that's quite Awhile ago, but from what
I knew whenever I was a little boy, uh quite a few people, if they
had more children than they could hardly feed, they would give one
away once in awhile, but he was always given to some of his people.
So my dad was given to Mr. Sinclair Lowry, and my father always
spoke of three people, and he put emphasis on their names to the
extent that he called Sinclair Lowry...my uncle Sine. And there
was two sisters in that family that I remember very well. Now there
was others that I don't remember so well, and one of them was my
aunt France...he would talk about, and the other one was my aunt
Pert, and both of these were Lowry ladies...young ladies at that
time. And I become to know myself, being born in 1902, uh, aunt Pert,
and aunt France, but I never remember seeing uncle Sine.
19
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: Now Mr. Fuller can you give me some connection, you might remember
aunt Pert and Aunt who?
P: France.
B: Aunt France...can you give me some relation...some recollection
about them from your experience? Do you remember these two?
L: Uncle Sinclair, he uh...had the home place. See his father, Allen
Lowry, was the man that was killed, well uncle Sinclair then became
"3av^
heir of the home place, where Henry Beer grew up, and all the boys.
Where Allen Lowry and his wife reared the family. Uncle Sinclair
then owned that home. He lived and died in that home, where...where
they were born and reared.
B: Now uncle Sine is Sinclair Lowry?
P: Yes, Sinclair.
L: His name is Sinclair Lowry.
B: Brother to Henry Barry Lowry.
L: Brother to Henry Barry. Henry Barry was the baby boy.
P: Now wait...wait a minute
L: ...of about ten boys I believe.
P: Sinclair...I believe we're...I believe we're a little bit ahead of
ourself. Uncle Sine was the...was the brother of Allen Lowry, who
was Henry Barry's father. That correct?
L: No sir.
P: Isn't it?
L: Uncle Sine was Allen Lowry's son.
20
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: Oh, is that so?
L: Yes sir. Uncle Sinclair was my father's brother, and my father was
Allen Lowry's son.
B: And your father was who?
L: Calvin Lowry.
B: Calvin Lowry. Now do you know the...
L: Now see...Purdy Lowry lived on Saddle ree. The oldest boy was
named uh...let's see now...the oldest boy left here during the war,
and went to Tennessee. And he married and reared a family in
Tennessee. His name was Murdoc, and he didn't come back until he
was forty years old That is he was gone forty years. He left a
young man, about the age of twenty-one, and stayed forty years be-
fore he came back to visit his country. And he was the oldest one
of Allen Lowry's boys. And it came...Allyen...then it came to uh,
pat...Patrick Lowry lived over near Harper's Ferry. And then there
was one lived on Saddlejree. What was the Saddle ree man...?
P: I wouldn't know vhts avte.
B: A jwry?
L: Huh? It was one of the Lowrys lived on Saddle...June Lowry's daddy
you know. We might think about it after while ived on Saddlejree.
Anyway, there was uh, about uh, ten or eleven of these brothers,
and they were all Allen Lowry's boys. See Allen Lowry is the man
that they tried to take his land.
P: Oh yeah, I see that now.
21
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: Allen Lowry was the man who owned the two hundred and fifty acres
of land, and the Scotch tried to fool him off from his land you know.
Get him to leave so that he could get his land. It was a man named
Bob McKinzie, owned two hundred and fifty acres of land joined
Allen Lowry, who owned two hundred and fifty. And this Scotsman tried
to scare Allen Lowry off from his land. And he couldn't do that.
P: Mr. Fuller, let me tell...let me inject here...uh, my father was
a little bit older than you are.
L: Yes.
P: Uh some twenty-five thirty years wasn't he?
L: Well, I expect so.
P: Yeah, about twenty-five or thirty years older than brother Fuller
here, and my father had one of the keenest memories, I believe, of
any man I ever heard talk. Uh, he didn't have a formal education,
but he had a handwriting that would equal any professor that I
knew of. And he always read his-...hs Bible and his newspaper. Now
what I wanted to say was that my daddy taught his children all the
things that he knew about the Lowry family. And uh, he always told
us that these Scotsmans that Mr. Fuller has talked about who wanted
Mr. Allen Lowry's land...uh they couldn't go right out and kill him
and take it, but what they did, according to my father, they took
some of the meat out of their smokehouse, and they went and put it
in uncle Allen Lowry's haystack, and went and got a warrant for his
arrest for stealing meat. And went there the next morning, and because
22
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...he...he denied it, they made him dig his own grave, and took
his oldest son, who was William, and shot and let U fall in
that grave and covered him up. And then they could take his land.
L: Yeah, that's part of the story. Uh, they didn't only take meat, but
they took his wagon harness, and buggy harness. They took the har-
nesses of his wagon and so forth along with the meat. And Allen
Lowry had cut his corn and shqoked'it in the field. And they would
but a piece of meat in one shock, and a piece in another one, and
another, and the other one...and they hung the harnesses under Allen
Lowry's wagon sie And so the next morning they came over there
and-arrested him for robbery. And said, "You stole our meat, and
you stole our wagon and buggy harnesses last night. We tracked you,
where you came back from over there, uh, in the frost." And uh, he
says, "I've got plenty of meat in my smoke house, and I've got
plenty of harnesses for all my horses. I don't have to steal."
Said, "Come on out here, let's look around a little bit." And they
walked on out to the wagon shelter, and McKinzie pointed, "Yonder's
my harness "fi6_e ." And Allen looked and saw them, and said,"Yeah
you put them there." And he said, "My meats around here somewhere."
He had a slave along with him that hid the meat, and he knew just
where he put the meat. And he says uh, to his slave, "Go search out
there for the meat." And he went from shock to shock, and gathered
up the meat. And then they arrested Allen, and the...and William,
and Uncle Sinclair...they put...my father was locked up. They locked
23
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: ...up...even to the baby girl, aunt Pert. She was in the smoke house
they locked the whole family up.
B: In the smoke house?
L: In the smoke house, all they could get. There was some that they
couldn't findpyou know. But uh, they locked my father, Sinclair,
and all of them up. And uh, what happened...the reason why they
killed William and Allen. Allen Lowry had gotten behind with his
tax. And William was working off, making money. He came home and
went to Lumberton, and payed his father's tax.
B: Where was.
L: And he got a sheriff's deed for the land. And uh, McKinzie was
sharp enough to kill the two that owned the original deed, and
the sheriff's deed. Trying to...undermin#AYou know he was trying
to...he thought he was using skill you know. And uh, we'll kill
the uh, two what holds the deeds. And ehs&!a..that's the reason
for killing William and Allen. And they turned my dad and Uncle
Sinclair, and Aunt P a a' loose. Uh, in fact they got uh...one or
two white people, white men, and locked up in the smoke house, for
feeding, uh, and helping in...in the process. And uh, after it was
all over they took them out. And during the time they were in the
smoke house, Aunt P4 told me, the home g qrds were gathered
around the smoke house, and she heard one say, "What'll we do with
them?" Another soldier...home g rd said, "Let's set this smoke-
house afire and burn all of them out." And another one said, "Nope
24
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: ...you'll not do that. There's women in there, and if anybody stole
the meat and the harnesses, the women didn't have a thing to do
with it. And the first man strikes a match...I'll kill him." These
were the home GArc on the outside that Aunt Prd told me. And she
heard them saying that. And then they would go off and caucus and
come back, "What'll we do with them?" "Let's burn the house up, burn
them all up." And another one would say "Nope. You'll not burn them
up. The first man strikes a match...I'll kill him." Now Aunt P?
told me this, and finally, they opened the smoke house up and, and
uh, had the slaves to hook the mule to the cart, and told them to
put some shovels on the cart, and they drove on towardsAllen Lowry's
home from Bob McKinzie's, and when they crossed the line between,
Allen Lowry and McKinzie, they stopped, and they made them dig the
grave, and then they blindfolded Allen...I mean Allen and his oldest
son William. And made them stand with their backs to the grave, and
these home 44rds all fired at one time. And in the mean time, Henry
Barry who was only seventeen years old, he had crawled through the
bushes, and was hid over behind some bushes, listening to all that
COW
was said. And after they left, Henry Barry claims he emeo out to
the grave, and he made a...some kind of a statement that he wouldn't
stop 'til he killed the last one of the home gaurds. The people who
had shot his father. And so from then on, Henry Barry went in the
woods, with a...one gun. But white friends, and other friends help-
ed him with...get ammunition and other guns. One white man-e.r
25
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: ...ordered him a rifle...that uh,.Kermit, my son has in his
possession. Uh, the night I think...when they killed sheriff King,
somehow, somewhere, they got Henry Barry's rifle away. And when
Earl made a speech at the normal college out here, his speech was
put in the uh...Wilmington Star. And then I got a letter from a
weo a aged woman in Wilmington, and said, "I read uh, Dr. Earl
Lowry's address, and I'm interested in that. And I've got Henry
Barry Ri...Henry Barryy rifle here. And if you'll bring me ten
dollars I'll give you the rifle. Now the rifle cost a hundred dollars.
A white man ordered it for Henry Barry, and he paid uh...he paid
a hundred dollars for it a way back then when you could buy a gun
for two dollars. And the part...the metal part of it is solid
brass, And H.B.L. Henry Barry Lowry in big letters is on this brass.
Was put on it in the factory when it was made. H.B.L. Henry Barry
Lowry. And Kermit today has that rifle in his home, at Gastonia.
And so they came out, and dug the grave, and they blindfolded. The
two men who held at ease, and killed them and turned the other ones
a loose. And that was the solution. And that's a pretty logical thing
you know. And that's pretty....
P: Well, I've learned something....
END TAPE ONE, SIDE ONE
26
LUM 123AB
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
DATE: MARCH 27, 1973
TAPE: ONE
SIDE: TWO
P: I have another comment I'd like to make, because as I said, as I
foresaid, my father was about thirty years older than Mr. Fuller.
L: I was born in '81, when was he born?
P: Mine? You were born in '81? Mine...my dad was twenty years then,
he was born in...born in '51...thirty years!
L: Thirty years.
P: He was born in '51.
L: Thirty years.
P: And by him having uh, fifty years age on Mr. Fuller, uh, he saw a
lot of things, and heard a lot of things, that...before Mr. Fuller
was even born.
L: He saw Henry Barry didn't he...he was with Henry Barry.
P: Yeah. Yeah, he knew all the Lowry gang, from the first one to the
last one, and the whole time that they reigned. So what I wanted
to say...
L: In other words, he grew up with Henry Barry?
P: He grew up with Henry Barry.
L: Yeah.
P: What I wanted to say too, was the fact that my dad...it was unc...it
was uncle Sine that raised my dad. His home was only a short distance
from this place where they were killed. And he...he heard the guns
fire, uh, that killed Uncle Allen, and his son William. And he also
27
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...heard Henry Barry when he came out of the bushes, as Mr. Lowry
has told you. And Mr....and Henry Barry made a uh...made uh...a
quote from...quoting from my daddy, that he said, that he would
kill the last man that had anything to do with it, if God give him
the life and the strength to do it. And there was only one that
got away, and he left here, and never did come back.
B: Uh, how old was your Aunt Fran when they were locked up in that log
...in the smoke house? How...what age do you assume she may have
been at that time?
L: I would uh...
B: She was the baby of the family.
L: She was uh...I would say she was in the teens. She was less than
twenty years old.
P: Yeah...yeah.
B: Have you ever uh, had any written record...I'm sure in the Lowry
family somewhere a lot of written documents have been uh...placed
in secure places concerning your family history. Personally, haven't
you had a lot of research done about your own family?
L: Yes, Earl has a book that S0v everything.
P: Tell who Earl is...tell them who Earl is.
L: My son Earl. He's got a book written, and is fixing to print it
now that goes back to the origin of the whole thing, and come up
all these secrets and stuff I was telling you about, come out in
28
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: ...his book. But uh, Dr. McGhee, he didn't know about all of that
you know...this book that's out.
P: I'd like to have another comment about Mr. Earl. He was one of my
best friends. He and I was in school together, h ...in the
second Old Main that was ever built. And we were good friends, and
uh, I know him very well. He's...he's one of the smartest men who
ever went to school at Old Main. I don't...I just don't know hardly
how he did it. I remember that when he graduated from a normal
school there...two year normal work. A fellow by the name of uh,
let me see now what his name was...
L: That state supervisor?
P: Yeah. Dewbowls...Newbowls.
L: Newbowls.
P: A fellow by the name of Mr. Newbowls was...
B: Newbowls?
P: Newbowls.
B: N-e-w-b-o-w-l-s?
P: I think that's correct.
B: Is the way it sounds.
P: I think that's correct. Uh, after he made a speech to the graduating
class, uh, Earl...Mr. Fuller's oldest son, was graduating in that
class, and he got a chance somehow or another...he was...Earl was
just one of these fellows that didn't like...didn't let nothing get
away. And back then he was thinking in terms of higher education.
29
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: And he went to Mr. Newbowls on the...on the ground, and asked Mr.
Newbowls where he could go to further his education. And Mr.
Newbowls, according to what Mr. Earl told me, and I know it's the
truth, because I've had him tell it to other people in my presence,
and he gives the same story. That Mr. Newbowls told him that there
weren't nowhere for him to go now, that he had had all the education
that he needed to teach for his people, and to get out and start
teaching for his peop...people. And if he had took that for an
answer, he wouldn't have never been able to accomplish what he's
accomplished. He's one of the...
L: Uh, he told him it was against the law for the Indians to go to
white schools, so you've gone your limits.
B: And it's interesting though...how...do you...can you tell me how
he pursued to...to get more education? What did he do after...then
he didn't accept that answer?
L: He...he didn't pay a bit of attention to what he said, it just
tickled him you know because uh, he...he knew he could go. Go
anywhere he wanted to. He didn't pay any attention to that. It
didn't effect him at all.
B: And he is a...he holds a doctors degree today? A...is a medical
doctor?
L: Yes sir.
P: Not only a medical doctor, he's a surgeon.
L: Yeah, he holds a...he uh, after he uh, finished there, he uh, went
3Q
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: ...to McKinzie College one year.
B: And where is that located?
L: That's in uh...McKinzie College is Lebanon, Illinois. Uh, Clifton,
Clifton Oxendine was with him that year in Lebanon, Illinois, in
McKinzie College. And later on, uh, one of uh, Oscar Sampson's boys
graduated, and married the presidents daughter.
B: Otis Sampson?
L: No...no.
B: But who was the...?
L: James.
P: James Sampson..
L: James.
P: James Sampson.
B: And married the president's daughter.
L: Married the president's daughter at McKinzie College. And then Earl
went to the University of Chattanooga til he graduated and got his
degree, and then he came and taught in the normal two years after
he finished college. He taught...he was a science teacher for two
years. And then he went to Wake Forest to get special study in
uh...physics and chemistry, in order to enter Vanderbilt. Now
Vanderbilt University was the highest graded medical school in the
south. And there wasn't many students...no one could enter there
but an "A" student. And so Earl was a little dubious about his
science and chemistry and physics, and so he went to Wake Forest
31
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: ...to -6 y chemistry and physics. And then when he finished,
reviewed that over, he entered Vanderbilt, and stayed there until
he got his degree in surgery, and he was one of six students that
their grades were so high...they didn't have to take a final exam.
And the highest one was a Jew. He was just one fraction of one per
cent in the final exami...examination, at the graduation. He was
the highest man, the Jew was,.but he was just a fraction of one per
cent ahead of Earl. And Earl was the second highest of the six. And
they didn't have to take a...
B: And where is Mr. Earl located today?
L: He's in DesMoines, Iowa. He's retired, he uh...took his last year
with the Surgeon general in Washington D.C. He was there two years,
and retired with the Surgeon General in Washington, in
P: Mr. Fuller, tell us about your son's participation uh, in the...in
the war, about the generals and majors, and these high ranking
officers, and even the President./He was iuh, first made Lieutenant
Cokpel, you know, and then he was made FPll Co nel, and...
B: This is Earl?
L: Yeah. And he was working in uh, Atlanta, Georgia, in the government
place in Atlanta. Uh, I can't think of the name of it. But he was
sent overseas, and in two and one half months after he had gone
overseas...he was appointed chief consultant in surgery, in the
European Theater, which covered five nations. And he was chief
consultant in surgery, appointed by, uh the war, you see, so he,
32
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: ...he worked at five different nations, and he would fly in an
airplane, and when general...what was that general's name...
Eisenhower.
P: Eisenhower, and Patton.
L: Nope. Was it general Eisenhower that was wounded?
P: No, it was Patton, I think it was General Patton.
L: General PAtton. When General Patton was wounded, Earl flew to where
he was on a plane, and he took charge of him, but he said he knew
that the condition of his...he was in a...a car wreck I believe.
In a car wreck. And he knew he couldn't live when he went to him.
But he was the doctor who took care of General Patton when he got
uh...wounded in the automobile wreck.
P: And I've heard that he also uh...
L: He was Eisenhower's doctor. Eisenhower would go to him in Georgia
when he was a...uh, the regular general in...in another town in
3eorgia, and said to him one day, uh, "You know, I'm going to be
a President of the United States." Eisenhower was then a general.
General Eisenhower, and he says, "Doctor..." or he called him
corel, "Colel...I'm going to be President of the United States
one of these days, and I've got you on my list, I'll look after
you."
B: And what did he do for Earl after he got to be President?
L: When he got to be President, then he uh, moved Earl...he was the
one that moved Earl with the Surgeon General in Washington. And he
33
SUBJECT: DR:FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: ...stayed with him until he retired. He didn't have much to do
then with the Surgeon General you know. He just...in office...just
into office. Then he...that's what he did for him, he...he gave him
that pos$,ion, until he retired.
P: I understand that uh, Mrs. Mamie Eisenhower is...he's...he's Miss
"Amie...Amie Eisenhower's doctor now...is that correct?
L: His...his widow woman?
B: Eisenhower's widow, yes.
P: Yeah, his widow.
L: I'm not sure about that, it seems like I did hear...
P: I've heard that...I've heard that.
L: It seems like I did hear him speak about this.
P: And I've also heard that he uh...the doctor who was uh, Mr. Truman's
doctor...I'm...I don't remember his name now. But on one occasion,
doctor...I mean President Truman had a kind of a cough that lingered,
and they didn't...wasn't able to pin oint it somehow or another,
and they called Earl in to...in that case.
L: Yeah, I believe I heard him tell about that in the Sunday schooll
lecture oat here one time in the church.
B: Do you know of another Indian man from Robeson County who proceeded
your son in quiring a medical doctor's degree?
L: Uh, you know Tillford Lowry, he's uh...he's brother Henry's son.
He's a...he's a doctor in Sweetwater, Tennessee. And then uh...
P: Mr. Johnny.
34
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: And Johnny, J.A.B. Lowry...another brother of Tillford's, he...he's
dead now. He lived in Crew, Virginia, and he was overseas in
World War I. Earl was in World War II. But Johnny was in uh, World
War I, and he settled-in Crew,'Virginia. And he died i& a heart
attack And since then I was going...marching for a meal, and I
looked back and I saw the Bishop of our Conference in the march,
and afterwhile I heard somebody walking up, and he he got beside
of me in the march. And he says, you know, uh, Dr. Earl's widow,
gave us ph...one hundred and fifty thousand dollars the other day
for one of the schools in Virginia."
P: Dr. Johnny's widow?
L: Yeah, Dr. Johnny's wido yeah. Dr. Johnny, J.A.B. Lowry in Crew,
Virginia. He says, "When I'm holding conferences in Crew, Virginia,
Dr. Lowry's home was my home. I always spent my nights with Dr.
Lowry. He was an outstanding member of our Methodist Church in
Crew, Virginia. And his widow donated a hundred and fifty thousand
dollars the other day to one of the schools." And so Johnny died.
He had a lot of money. ,He had a big insurance you know, and he...he
probably had...
P: Half a million dollars?
L: Several hundred thousand dollars, he...he was...he had plenty of
money.
B: It seems a tradition that the Lowry's pursued education. Can you
35
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: ...in any way relate this to the land base of the Lowrys because
Allen Lowry had something to start with, and they were able to
hold on to it? This kind of security and collateral, uh, enabled
them to send their children other places to school. Would you
agree with this, or what accounts for the Lowry education?
L: Well, I think that's correct, because uh...the uh, procedure of
Henry Barry Lowry, and the steps he took, as standing up for his
peopleyyou know. Uh...put an incentive in all the Lowrys to...to
try to accomplish something. I think that we will just charge that
to the braveness of Allen Lowry's act in the war, and Henry Barry
Lowry's procedure uh, to uh, show the people that they should
stand up for their rights.
B: Well this is one thing w & probably take two or three more
conferences with you, but I wanted to talk to you about your family,
the geneology. And then, something about the educational progress
of the Indians in Robeson County. And knowing that you were the
first student I think to be graduated from the Hope School?
L: Yes air.
B: I wanted to just uh, have a time to come back just to talk about
education, but there's so much you know...
L: Uh, the school up there, I was a looking at a bulletin out there,
and it said the school at Pate was a elementary school from 1887
to 1903 I believe when it was moved to Pembroke it was just an
elementary school. But that's a...that's as far from being correct,
36
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: ...as the east is from the west. Uh, because prior to that...uh,
after this school was established, and prior to the time, we had
schools, about twelve Indian schools over the county. And we had
men like Johnathan Spalding, and they called him professor Jacobs,
who would come up here and teach the schools in the county at
Union Chapel, and the first Indian schools. And these men were
college men. And men like Oscar Sampson, and Foster Sampson, and,
and uh...and Anderson Locklear, and these older teachers...
B: Moore...was Moore...
L: Moore, he...he didn't...he went to school elsewhere you know. He
finished a four year normal at, at uh...uh, Lumberton under
professor Allen. Uh...the D...Dr. Allen came from the north. He was
a Yankee Negro. And uh, he established a school in Lumberton, that
would give a four year normal, which would be equal to college work.
And uh, Mr. Moore graduated under uh, Professor Allen at Lumberton.
B: Allen...Allen was black. I want to understand this. Allen was black,
L: Yes, from the north.
B: And he was over this four year school?
L: He was over this particular school at Lumberton.
B: Was that a white?
L: He built that school.
B: Did just whites go to that...?
L: No, for colored people...Negroes.
37
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: O.k.
L: It was a Negro school in Lumberton, and professor Allen...
Why)when I was a young teacher, and would be in the office of the
county superintendent, like...uh, Mr. McCallister. When professor
Allen would come in there, and I was standing...he was a black man,
uh, professor McCallister would get up out of his chair and shake
hands with him, and call him professor Allen. And uh, he stood as
a...a outstanding man in Lumberton where he was working. And men
like Johnathan Spalding, and professor Jacobs taught in this county.
And men like Oscar Sampson, and Anderson went to them to school.
And after they were taught by these men, then they entered the
school up here. And uh, this school at Patewas called a Nona
Standard School...a No&a Standard School, meaning you can study
anything you want to, Greek, Latin, Hebrew, all the sciences,
anything you want to take, you could take it up there. It had
nothing to do with an elementary school, because Oscar Sampson
was said by the county superintendent to be one of the best
students in the county, regardless of color. And he made a hundred
per cent every year on spelling. We had, back then, all the teachers
of all three of the races, had to go and take two days public
examination, in all the books that they taught in the public school.
And the county superintendent said Oscar Sampson was one of the
smartest students in the county, and he made a hundred per cent of
spelling every year. He knew every word, he knew all the rules of
38
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR.PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
...spelling. For instance, I learned this rule from Oscar, proceed,
pro, ex, and suc...proceed, exceed, and succeed...is cee-e-d, and
all the other cedes is c-e-d-e, and that was a rule in spelling
that I got from Oscar Sampson. And it caused me to make a hundred
sometimes when I was on examination. But the...Oscar knew all the
rules of spelling, and he never missed a word on...at Lumberton
on this examination. And he was a student of what they called the
elementary school. And uh, he would go on examination with graduates
from Wake Forest, and Davidson College, and make just as much as
they did. And then went to school at Patey So it wasn't elementary.
I took...I went up there to school after I finished high school at
Hopewell, and the professor says, The Indians)you know, it was
against the law for them to go to white colleges, but I'll give
you a college education right here." And he ordered a catalog
from a northern school that taught the...the...they taught three
grades. They taught normal, advanced normal, and scientific. And
he says, "If you'll graduate these three, we'll order all the
books...I'll give you a degree." And so I took the normal, advanced
normal, and the scientific...covered all the sciences you know,
chemistry, physics, botany, zoology, physical eeIk, and all
that. They covered all the sciences, and astronomy, and uh, when
I finished, he says, "Now if you can get up five dollars, I'll
give you a master's degree. If you'll get three dollars, I'll
39
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER'BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BRROKS
L: ...give you a scientific degree. And I couldn't raise but three
dollars. Back then, one cent was as big as a cartwheel. You know
the professor...uh, the professor wasn't getting but sixty dollars
a month to teach the college up there...sixty dollars a month. So
he couldn't help me. It took his sixty dollars to live on. hat
I'm the first man that got above sixty dollars. The man ahead of
me taught for sixty dollars, and when I...the year I taught, they
paid me seventy-five. I'm the first man that got a raise up there,
sixty dollars, from sixty to seventy-five. So I got seventy-five
dollars a month the year I taught. So money, you couldn't get
money back then you know. And so I couldn't raise but three dollars,
and I got a college degree hanging up back there in the sun parlor.
And says, Lowry completed the scientific course,
as it was taught in Pembroke, or in Coritan Normal College." Now
that's on my degree...Coritan Normal College.
B: Um huh. And you were born in 1881, and it was not until 1885...is
that correct?
L: '87.
B: '87 that ...
L: That this school was...
B: ...this school was established?
L: Yes sir.
B: And how old were you now when you entered that school?
L: I was uh...about uh...seventeen.
40
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: And all the education you had prior to then...to then was one of
these community schools like the Hopewell?
L: At Hopewell. And schools back then wasn't graded like they are
now. You could study anything. At Hopewell, we took uh...Sanford's
High Analytical Arithmetic.. There was a Sanford's Intermediate,
Sanford Common School, and Sanford's High Analytical. Three books
in Sanford's course of mathematics. And we took all three of them
at Hopewell. And you could study just as far as you could go. And
the school of the kind of teacher you
had.
B: The people in the community had to put up money for the building,
and then the state just gave them a little token fee to...?
L: Yeah, a little fee to build it. The people went in the woods and
hewed out the frame for the old college at Pates. And the man sold
them the acre of land for ten dollars I believe. Old man Jacobs,
preacher Jacobs sold them an acre of land for ten. And the people
went in the woods and hewed out the timbers, and raised money, and
bought the lumber, and built it...and then the state made them a
small corporation to pay the teacher.
B: Is this _...
L: And Mr. W.L. Moore was the first teacher.
B: Is this...now I may have my history ahead of itself...is this when
the state gave...this is not the five hundred dollars a year they
41
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: ...gave, I'm sure.
P: No...the...
B: They just payed the teacher's salary when it was up at Pates...is
that what they paid?
L: Just the teacher's salary.
P: They had to build that building too without any money.
L: Yeah.
P: They built that school without any money, and then the state
appropriated five hundred dollars, if they would complete their
building...they would give-that then for the support of it.
L: Yeah.
P: Uh, the teacher's salary, and the whole...uh, the whole thing.
L: And that five hundred dollars had to pay for nine months you see.
P: Yes..
B: Um huh.. What about the uh...input...well, like you, did you have
te get some of the wood? You said the men went out and hewed the
wood...did you actively participate in the construction of the...?
L: No, I was...I was a little boy then.
P: His father ...his father...
L: I wasn't in there, but...I did go around with Oscar Sampson and
raise the money to buy the ten acres in Pembroke, to move the
school from Pate to Pembroke.
P: Now this land was...was bought too for ten dollars an acre.
42
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: That was promoted money.
L: That's it, yeah.
P: That up yonder might have been given....
B: No, he said it was uh, Jacobs, a preacher Jacobs.
L: Jacobs, preacher Jacobs...
B: Do you know the first name?
L: He charged them ten dollars.
P: Is that so?
B: What is the first name of preacher Jacobs at Pate...do you know?
L: Uh, Bill Jacobs, William Jacobs.
B: Bill...William Jacobs?
L: Everybody called him Bill Jacobs, Reverend Bill Jacobs.
B: And also the land that uh, is that P.S.U. now that was bought for
ten dollars... the original plot for the building?
L: No, it was ten acres...
P: A hundred...a hundred...
L: kwyay-veLLk
P: It was a hundred fL Ct
L: From Mr. Overland. And then later they kept adding to it. But it
stayed ten acres for a long time.
B: Do you have any old pictures of the building at Pate? I'm sure you
must have pictures. I don't want to see them, I just want to know
that you have this kind of documents.
L: Yes, I have...
43
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: Like students that went to that school?
L: I believe there's...this uh...I'm not sure...it seems like part of
the old pictures
P: There's a...there's another question that I'd like to ask you,
and I believe I asked you the other day when I was here...I don't
uh...uh, see if you remember it well enough. Uh, what do you think
would be...would have been rather the condition of the Indian race
of people in Robeson County, had it not been for Henry Barry Lowry?
L: Uh, Henry Barry Lowry's move I think saved the...the country here.
In other words, uh, there wouldn't have been but two races here
now. That's what I would conclude. That uh, by this time there
wouldn't have been but two races here. Part of the people here
would have went for white, and the other ones for uh...
P: Colored.
L: Colored.
B: And do you see that uh maybe the reason why more of our older people
didn't get education...I've often heard it said by old people that
maybe we were a little bit too proud to go to school along with the
blacks. Like Mr. Moore was willing to go to the black school in
Lumberton. What do you...
L: Well Mr. Moore, well he was reared in Columbus County you know,
until he was a grownA man...he was a grown man when he came up here
andrstarted teaching school. There were several Moores down...my
brother married a Moore, Josephine. His first wife was Josephine.
44
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: She was the daughter of Arron Moore in Columbus County. And my
oldest sister married A Vlidkoa Moore, a preacher. Uh, I
consider the best preacher that's ever been in North Carolina.
And f14L Moore, you remember?
P: I've heard of him...yeah, I've heard of him.
L: He...he was considered the...the best preacher in the state. He
could go anywhere, and...and uh, preach. He was uh...he had a
master's degree you know.
P: Sort of like you was. I want you to tell me a story. Remember when
you and your wife went to the west, and you went to that place
what's called Devil's Half Acre?
L: Yeah.
P: Tell her that...I'd like to hear it.
L: We...we were going...my oldest daughter lived in Harlem Montana
and we decided we'd drive through to Harlem, Montana. And we was
uh, a week or more going. And uh, wea we were up there, we got uh,
we got up in the state of...let's see what state were we in, where
we got...Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming. We were in Wyoming
once...one Sunday morning. We had spent uh, Saturday night at the
hot springs, the hottest springs in the world. We spent Saturday
night at a hot springs, and...and then we got up early the other,
early Sunday morning, and drove about fifty miles, and stopped in
a big city for breakfast. And on going down the street, we looked
45
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: ...across the street and we saw a big brick church along the front
there was a Methodist...First Methodist Church of the town. We
went in. And we suggested, the town has a Methodist Church, and we
were both Methodist...we'd stay for preaching. And so we went in,
and the pastor met me you know, and introduced himself, and I
introduced myself. I happened to have one of these Methodist books
in my pocket. All I had to do was show him that, and that's...made
him know I wasn't a hum bug. And he says,.tWell now, uh, the Bible
class teacher is looking for somebody to give the devotions to uh,
to have the prayer for them this morning. I'm going to take you and
introduce you to him, and...and he'll use you in the prayer."
And so I went in, and he asked me to...to lead the prayer in the
opening. And then he says, now...I want you to come back in uh, for
preaching. And we went back in the front. And he came to me and
says...we, me and my wife took our seat back. He came down the aisle,
and said, "Now I know you're wanting to sit with your wife, but
when I'm through preaching I'm going to call on you to come up to
the stage and have something to say." So I went up to the stage,
and...and uh, told them I was a southerner, I was from North Carolina.
And I says, if you people up here that's got a real bright skin,
better...go down to...to North Carolina, and go down on the beach
and lay around awhile in the sun, you would=havera tanelikeelve.
got: Yoaud ah, have uh, a tan, a good tan on your face. And I guess
you think uh...uh, I'm from the south and uh, And I've got to tell
46
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: ...you...a good tan on my face. The difference with me is...you
and myself, I was born with this tan. I'm a Indian. I'm a Indian
from North Carolina. And then it looked like that everybody got
about six inches high. And I went on with speaking, told them about
my Indian people down here you know, and we came out on the yard,
and they gathered around us and said,"Which way are-yousgoigg?" I
said we were following thirty. Well uh, there's a Highway Three that
goes around and they come together again. And uh, seventy-five miles
from here there's a place they call "The Devil's Half Acre." And
it's a...it's a great uh...uh, mystery. You...you...you don't want
to miss that. Uh, you want to go...go Highway Three, and stop at
The Devil's Half Acre. You never saw nothing like that. And so we,
we followed three, and when we got to uh, The Devil's Half Acre and
parked, another car parked over there, and they jumped out of the
car and come laughing you know. Said, "You might not know me, but
I heard you speak in the church this morning..."
B: They followed you?
L: "And uh, we just wanted to hear you talk some more. And we followed
you, my wife and..-.and uh, two or three of the other church members."
Was all in the car. "Acafoad of usimand we just, we followed you
seventy-five miles to hear you talk some more. And they..."We'll
take you around." They were used to the place, and they took us
around, and demonstrated that there was a way down there...looks
47
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: ...like the people down there was uh...I t they were statues
you know. Was made uh, Stone statues, And they said they hadn't
never heard of...it was pretty deep down there, and straight down
almost. Said there hadn't never been but two people down there
and back. And there was a half acre way down yonder, and you
couldn't tell just how it was because it was so far down. And it
looked like statues standing all around.
B: What did the two who went down there say about it? The two who
came back, what did they say?
L: Uh they...they were just telling us the history of it, and said,
"We come down here right often, but they...we've never known but
two people to go down there and come back." It's like uh...what's
-thmhe ru6...Niagra Falls, you know, it's a place that uh, you can't
get down and back.
P: Mr. Fuller, I have another question. I'd like to know...since uh,
since we've been talking here, and we find out, or I....
L: It's about out, ain't it?
B: Mr. Fuller, I've got some more. I've got....
P: I've...I've found out since we've been talking here that education
is money, and money 4d-economic...and money is economics. You see,
the person who has money has the privelege to have power to do
something. And them that don't have no education, don't have any.
Do you think this...this uh, has any uh, rele...relevance on our
day tqday, as far as we've come that the Indian people are still
48
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...not having as good an education as they need?
L: Well uh, that's a...that's a very deep...deep question to think
about, but uh I think there must be something to that.
P: I think so too. Now the reason I posed that question is this: my
father was poor, and he had a big family. And I had only one
brother out of eight that ever taught school.
B: That being?
P: My brother Johnny. V&Si older than I am. He taught for
about uh, well, he retired.
B: So he retired?
P: Yeah, he's retired teaching. But when we were in school, my...my
father and mother started both of us together. He's a year and six
months older than I am, but she started me along with him, and I
was only five. Well, after we got big enough to help out on the
1: wouv,
farm...he'd go to school today, and -r4igo tomorrow, and whenever
I was in school he was at work in my place on the farm. And one
day I got tired of that, and uh, quit school. But I didn't quit
until he and I both came back when we were men, and went back to
the college, and finished the sixth and seventh grade. And that's
the only school I've ever had. And the reason I quit was simply
because before I was eighteen years old I left here and went to
the north, and got a job in the automobile shop. And I came back
home the...on the third year to go back to school. And looked like
after three weeks I just had to quit, because I found out then,
49
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
;7,. X-MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...that the school teacher was making forty-five dollars a month,
-S
and I was making thirty-five and forty dollarY a week in the
automobile shop.
L: Yeah.
P: So the...the nice young girl that was my girl friend, when I talked
it over with her, and after she agreed that we would get married
then, instead of waiting any longer...if I would ask for her, and
I loved her so much I asked for her.
L: Yeah.
P: And that settled my schooling then.
L: And Johnny kept going?
P: Johnny kept going. In fact, when he graduated I bought him an out-
fit. I bought him shoes, hat, a suit, underwear, and socks, and tie,
and everything, and shirt...and sent it to him.
L: Thirty-five dollars 0- Lolrvcarit wasn't no incentive to
you, and you we're getting that once a week.
P: It wasn't no incentive to me. And uh, of course I would've liked
to had a college education, but at that time I couldn't afford to
do anything else, but go ahead and get married, and go on back to
the automobile shop, And I finally stayed there until 1931. And
this was in 19...uh, 1922.
B: Uh, I'd like to just have you tell me that uh...maybe I can come
back and cover another phase of the Indian history, as far as
the progress of the Lowrys. I'm real concerned about how political
50
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: ...the lowrys got. And Allen Lowry, did you have any knowledge of
how involved the Indian people were back then as far as the
political process is concerned? Did you ever hear about voting, or
registering or being a part of the decision-making positions in
the county?
L: Now back uh...how far back now?
B: Well, say Allen Lowry.
L: You mean...
B: Do you recall anything...I know you mentioned we did have a Jim
Oxendine who was a Indian, to the House of Representatives in the
state, when it was formed. But uh, how much talking did your family
ever do as far as passing it from child to parent?
L: Way back then, the...it seemed like that uh...the uh...Indian people
uh, a lot of them believed in the Republican Party. You know the...a
lot of them would vote a Republican ticket. Uh, they claimed to
have uh, some meetings for that you know. They...at first uh, there
was a few of them that didn't like the Democratic ticket. But later
on, the Democratic ticket became a little more popular than the
Republican did. It kept gaining until later on, most uh, most of
the people got to be:Democratic.
B: But what...the thing I wanted some correction on, or if I'm wrong,
the little bit of reading I've done, I've learned that the reason
that the Indians maybe leaned toward the Republican was because it
51
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: ...under a Republican administration that Indians were uh, given
the right to attend schools. There was laws introduced that would
no prohibit Any person regardless of race to go to school.
L: Right.
B: And then another thing that it did...that it was the Republican
administration which uh, gave the Indians their right to vote
again. And so this...I think these two things...
L: That's why they...so many of them were Republicans...the reason the
Indians back then were voting the Republican ticket. But later on
the Democrats, uh, got ashamed e* all that, and they got to doing
more and more. And winning people over by making big appropriations
and that.
B: What kind of process, if you can remember your father-andrgrandfather,
did they have to register like we do today, or tell me something
about the process that enabled a man to vote?
L: Yeah, they...they had to register to vote. They had the registration
about through the country.
P: What did...Mr. Fuller, what did the uh, Red Shirts do for us? You
remember?
L: Well that was a...that what you call a Democratic move you know.
Try...but uh...changed some of the Republicans to the Democrats
you know.
52
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: 4-kc I people.
B: : _[^
L: I don't uh...I don't hardly think that it did very much for the
progress of the folks here.
B: Well I'm not aware of what the Red Shirts mean. You've got to tell
me.
P: Well the...this is from my father, I don't remember it. This happened
before my time, and uh, as I understand it, from what he said, the,
the Red Shirt organization, it wasn't an organization in its entirety.
Uh, the...the Democrats begin giving this Indian and that Indian a
shirt, and it was a red shirt so they would know them as they saw
them.
L: Trying to win the Republicans over to the Democratic Party.
P: That's right. And my father never did vote a Democrat ticket as long
as he lived.
L: Mine didn't either. Mine voted Republican ticket.
P: Republican ticket.
B: And both you men are probably registered Democrats?
L: Yeah, we...we voted Democrats, you're right.
P: That's right, and we...
B: Well what else did this....
L: But we later on got to...to where...we didn't all together look at
the party, but the man.
B: Right.
53
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: That...that...that's what we...but-yeek, there's been so many tactics
that the Democrats have put forth. Only a few years ago, uh, they,
they would always have as many as three running on...say on the uh,
board of...school board. And if you didn't vote for as many as three,
your...your vote wasn't counted.
L: Right.
P: You remember that?
L: Yeah.
P: And these are schemes whereby they...they, the Democrats uh, uh,
work in order to keep the Indians out of the schools, and in
pos unions of authorityship.
B: Well, what else did this red shirt mean other than just the means of
identifying. If a Indian said he would change from Republican to
Democrat, and they gave him a red shirt, what else did he get because
he changed his party?
P: Nothing, he...he got something took away from him.
L: He thought he might get a poslion later.
P: Probably did...probably did.
L: But he...he...he was...he was looking forward to a position.
B: Well, it's been about a hundred years...about a hundred years since
the Republicans had the Indians on their side so to speak in Robeson
County?
L: Well, fifty years anyhow.
54
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: Because this is...well, this is the first Republican Governor we've
had in this century, so it was in the late 1800s. And so now, young
people my age, there are a lot of us who are having the tendency to
respond to the Republican administration again. So do you agree with
me that maybe history is repeating itself?
P: Yes I do sister, that's what happened.
B: Alright, back during that time, the Republican administration, the
Indians were Republican, this was during the time that Henry Barry
Lowry reigned, when there quite...much tension in the county. We
never had a Republican....
END SIDE TWO, TAPE ONE
55
LUM 123AB
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
DATE: MARCH 27, 1973
TAPE: TWO
SIDE: ONE
B: Talking with Mr. Peter Brooks, and Dr. Fuller Lowry, and I was saying
that in comparing the tension in Robeson County about a hundred
years ago, with that of today...we have 'c similarities that...we
had a Republican administration at the time of the Henry Barry
Lowry reign, and now we have a Republican Governor for the first
time in this century, and also in Robeson County we are witnessing
quite much racial tension, and some violence that I feel could
possibly erI pt into a similar reign of terror unless our elected
officials respond in ways to avoid it. Now you may go on with your
comments.
P: What was I speaking about, the double-vote?
B: You were talking about just the thing concerning the Republican
reign I think. Anyway, tell us about the double vote, I'll get that
on tape, and as soon as you say when.
P: Well about the double vote, was the fact that uh, how they...how
the Democrat party manuvered. How...how they manuvered, looked
ahead and saw that uh, well maybe we better fix it so they won't
never amount to anything. Maybe we'll keep them under our thumb.
And uh, keep them from wher 4&-re having any education. This goes
back to the time that I spoke of previously whenever I had to work
a day and go to school a day. And that I had one brother that stuck
it out, and finally finished, and was a school teacher. And taught
56
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...until he retired. But this same-pro, uh, program is being
carried out today, as the way I see it...politically instead of
outright denying us the privilege to vote.
B: It's...they're using more subtle type tactics, something that we can't
put our hands on, but the control is there, even though we can't say
he is doing a gross visible injustice. But he's doing it in sort of
undercover type ways.
P: And I...I think that's what's wrong with the county. And then again,
I was also saying that a two-party system is one of the best
governments that the world has ever seen. Uh, every country that has
...there's several countries of the world today that have patterned
their government after the United States. In other words, they've
got a two-party system. And you take the countries that haven't,
and have a dictator, or a king...look at England if you please.
They've always held on to their king, and...and she was Old England
when we were a baby, so to speak, in our government. So what I'm
saying is that the two-party system, if it doesn't work as a two-
party system we'd just as well have a king or a dictator.
L: Yeah.
P: Because when one party stays in too long...too long, he gets too
dirty, and uses too many tricks, and we never can't catch up with
him no more. And he just...he just simply is able to carry on just
like he wants to. And the minority groups especially, have no way
of knowing his tricks, and...and getting along. And we are deprived
57
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...of a lot of things that we ought to have in Robeson County
today, on account of this.
B: Uh, Mr. Lowry I appreciate your talking with me, but there was some-
thing that I should have gotten at the beginning of my tape that I
want you to tell me now. Just give me your full name, and your
birth date, and your...the names of your parents, and if you can,
name your brothers and sisters, and I'll let this conclude our tape.
I've enjoyed it, but I don't want to hold you too long.
L: O.k. My father was named Calvin Lowry...he was brother to Henry
Barry Lowry. And my mother was named Maria Sampson. Uh, she was
born and reared uh, in the Deep Branch section. And she had a
brother named william Sampson who was a Baptist minister, and a
brother named John Sampson, a Methodist minister. So my father was
uh, originally a Methodist, and my mother was a Baptist, but she
joined the Methodist church after she was married. And there was
uh, twelve children. There was seven boys, and five girls. Now
H.H. Lowry was the oldest brother, and Billy Lowry, and Abner Lowry,
6C
and KennedyrLowry4-and- rank-Lowry, and Edmond--Lewryy and.-land F?
myself.J.E.F. Lowry. O.k. Then I had five sisters. The oldest sister
was named Annabelle, and the second oldest Deborah, and the next one
named Suzy...Susan, that's S-u-s-a-n...Susan, they called her Suzy.
Susan, and uh, the third one was named Nancy, who is now living.
tAe annts -i Nancy Rebel. And uh...and the baby be- was named uh,
Maria, she was named after mother, Maria the II. So she was the
58
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
L: ...baby girl, but the entire family is down to two. My sister Nancy,
the widow of Luther Rebels, living in town, and myself. And she's
uh, ninety-five, and I'm ninety-two.
B: This is what I was going to ask you. I've been reading something
about the Indians of Robeson County. We are traditionally written
about as loving alcoholic beverages. And it says that even though
we do have such a desire for alcoholic beverages, we seem to be long
livers. How old were your brothers at death? Like Mr. France, I
know he was old.
L: France was a hundred and two years and...and about uh, nine months,
somewhere, almost made a hundred three. And bro...my sister Annabelle
was the second, she was a hundred years old, and eleven months. And
then Billy was a hundred and three months. One hundred years old and
three months. And they were the longest livers in the family. We had
some now that died younger. My baby sister, she died perhaps uh,
around sixty. She was about the youngest, but from then on up, around
eighty and eighty-five, and was the life of the rest of the family.
B: And I've heard that Mr. Billy used to do some kind of exercise up
until the time of his death. Did he ride a bike, or...?
L: Oh yes, he rode a...a bicycle over to his farm, after, I imagine
ninety some years old. He had a farm over on Back Swamp, he'd ride
a bicycle over there, work all day, and come back on his bicycle at
night...living in Pembroke.
59
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: Well, I hope...
P: Tremendous... tremendous.
B: I hope the lord will bless you for many more years, and I'll get to
talk with you much more, because I could talk for hours and hours.
But I'm not going to make it too strenuous for you, but I do hope
you'll let me come back some time, and we can talk some more.
L: O.k...o.k.
L: Became friends, and the Indians hated to report him. For instance,
uh, after Bob McKinzie done all this work, he sold his farm to his
brother Samuel McKinzie, and Samuel McKinzie and his family of
five children were great friends. Uh, you've heard tell of a Miss
Mary McKinzie you know, that worked among the Indians so much, among
the Baptists and what have you. And uh, Miss Mary McKinzie was such
a great friend, she was the daughter of Samuel. Now they would
claim they couldn't help what the other folks had done, but we're
you're friends. And so we didn't want to expose them you know, and
you know, these that were so friendly m& passed away, and then we
don't mind writing the history now.
B: I think I had missed my question that asked why we didn't have any
written record of the Indians in Robeson County. But I felt too,
maybe we didn't do it ourselves because we were, a lot of us were
prohibited from learning the art of how to do it...actually how to
write it down.
L: Yeah.
60
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: To conclude the tape that was started at Mr. Fuller Lowry's, I
would like for you$Mr. Peter Brooks to give me just some-uh, historical
family history of your immediate family, begingng with you, your parents,
and then your wife, and down to your children.
P: About three and a half, or possibly four miles,-k, west of Roland,
I was born on April the twenty-ninth, 1902 to Sandy Brooks and
Effie Hunt Brooks, being the thirteenth child in a family of four-
teen children. My older brother, a year and sitonths older than I
was, we were always together, and loved one another very much. And
my father and mother wanted me to start school along with him when
he would start. So they started me to school at five years old. And
until I reached the age of about well, twenty-one years old, the
only formal education I'd ever had was to possibly the fourth grade.
And after nineteen...in the month oh uh, August, 1919, before I was
eighteen years old, me and this dear brother of mine left Robeson
County, and went to Detroit, Michigan, where we received a job in
the automobile shopo
B: You're speaking of Mr. Johnny...Johnny Brooks?
P: Um huh.
B: What contact did you have in Michigan to go to Michigan rather than
some other place?
P: We had a older brother there. Brother Raymond was in Michigan at
that time, and he already had a job when we got there. And I worked
61
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...along with my brother Raymond for about eight months...six
months after I got there. And then it happened so that he had to
go to another town and left me there, and...me and Johnny there.
And we made it there .e.wby ourselves then for a long time. And
kept on working where I was, in-Lth-e with the Timkin Detroit Axle
Company.
B: But this...well you said for a long time, is this...does this mean
months or years after Raymond left Detroit?
P: No, that was six months. Six months after we got there, Raymond
left Detroit. And uh, the next thing I quit that company, and went
to work with the American MotorCompany. Being young, and not
aquainted with city life, and how people got along, I didn't know
what kind of a job I was getting, and they carried me to the
upholstering department for the Wadsworth Manufacturing Company.
And I stayed there until that place changed hands, about three times.
I...I could...I remember all the changes, but the last change it was
sold to the Chrysler CoQperations, and I worked for them then about
seven years. At which time, I had been coming back here, and went
to school during the winter for...for two winters. Me and my brother
went in the sixth...started back to school in the sixth grade, after
we were men. And I went in to school two ears, and came back the
third year, and got dissatisfied in school. But my brother Johnny
kept on going to school, and taught school in the public schools of
62
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: Robeson County for a period of, I believe, twenty-seven years. At
least, he retired from school teaching. And the third year that I
came back, I began to get dissatisfied, as I foresaid, and I got
to watching everybody that was so busy with their school work, and
I begin to ask the price of school teaching, and it was forty dollars
a month. Forty-five dollars a month. And I was making in the automo-
bile shops from thirty-five to forty dollars a week. And I just got
so dissatisfied until I went back to the automobile shops. Uh,
terminating my school career. Under...not...not with...not without
understanding that uh, I would of certainly loved to had a college
education, but at that time, I didn't see where it would pay off.
In other words, money has always talked. And I became very much in
love with a young girl, and I told her the condition I was in about
my school. And the fact that I was making about, well better than
twice what the school teachers was making. And we got married, and
went back to Michigan. And we lived there until we had five chil-
dren...1931.
B: What was your wife's maiden name? Who was your wife?
P: Uh, I'll go back just a minute to the time when I talked it over
with this girl friend of mine that I was in love with very much, and
she said I would have to ask her father and mother. And if they did-
n't agree, it would be ai4gg a that we would get married and go back.
So that...
63
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: If they didn't agree, you would do it anyway? Is that what you are
saying?
P: That...that's what happened, yes. If they didn't agree, she would,
she would uh ...
B: Slip off?
P: She would slip off, run away so to speak. So when I asked her mother
for her. Let me tell you their names first. Uh, and not only their
names, but I'll tell you some of their uncles and aunts. She only
had one aunt on her mother's side. Her...her aunt on her mother's
side was named...umh...let me see now...I...I don't know her real
name, but they always called her "Dink' She married Mr.Meatgomery
Lowry. Mr. Montgomery Lowry had a brother by the name of Buddy Lowry,
married Miss Crosly Maynor. My wife...my wife's mother's maiden name
was jaynor. She was...she was also a sister of Mr. Alfred Maynor,
who was a minister. And Mr. Jim Maynor...
B: Maynor?
P: Maynor, who was a...who was a minister, and Mr. Luther Maynor, who
was a resident of near Pembroke for all his life. She was the first
cousin of the late Judge Lacy Maynor. And she married Mr. Jimmy
Cummings. And she was the daughter of Jimmy and Lester (?) Cummings.
Her name was Addie Maye Cummings. Uh, to that home, to that union
there was nine children. And whenever I asked for her, she...she be-
ing the oldest girl, her mother told me that she had nine children,
64
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...and she didn't have nary of them to give away. And whenever I
had to ask her dad too, he...he brought up the excuse that we were
both in school, and that she was so young. By the way, I'll tell you
her age, she was eighteen years old in February after we got married
in November, on the twenty-fifth of November, 1923I1 believe. And we
made our home in Michigan then, until 1931. Uh, 1931 brought on the
Hoover Depression, which every person my age knows all about.
B: Hewimahn-children did you have while you were-inh.Miehigan? What are
their names?
P: During the time we were in Michigan, or during the time -wmVa in
Michigan rather...she...she came back home for the birth of three of
the children that was born when we left there.
B: Why would she come home to have her babies?
P: Well the reason why she came home, was the fact that mothers were
so lg up with their daughters they didn't think they could have
a baby unless they 4id ix in their house. And uh, the oldest daughter
to this union, was Alfia, her grandfather named her after a story he
had read years and years before that. The next girl, Nettie, uh, by
the way, let me go back to Alfy. She fi...she married Reverend
Lawrence Maynor's boy.
B: Lonnie.
P: Lonnie Maynor. Nettie, the next girl married Stevie Lowry, the son
of Crossie as I aforesaid, Maynor...married Buddy Lowry, who was the
65
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...brother of Mentgomery Lowry.
B: This is uh, a point here I wanted to break in here. Some...in my
reading about my people, I've often found that if we begin tracing
a family tree, that some...somewhere back, we're going to run into
the same individuals. And it seems here that Nettie Lowry, your
daughter, and rev Lowry had common relatives.
P: Probably.
B: And this is what you're explaining, that Miss Crossie Lowry, whose
husband was Buddy Lowry...
P: Buddy Lowry.
B: Was the son of Montgomery's...
P: No, Buddy Lowry, and Mo&gomery Lowry were brothers. And uh...
B: Montgomery was married to who?
P: Montgomery was married to my wife's aunt. And the lady that Mr.
Buddy married wasn't no relation to me that I know of, she comes
from the Maynor family.
B: But after...after Nettie, then...?
P: After Nettie was Daphne. There were three...three daughters born
before there was a son. And I had read, the story of Martin Luther,
the great Protestant reformer, or I should say the great Protestant
protestor, uh, some time before he was born. And when he...when he
was born, and was a boy, I named him Martin Luther, after this
great After Martin, there was Jimmy, Paul, Ronald, and
66
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...Howard, six boys. And after Daphne, was Bernice and Joyce.
Bernice married Marvin Lowry. Uh, no relation that I know of
particular, and Joyce married Walt Maynor, a relative of Miss Crosjie
Maynor. Uh...Jimmy, I don't know who his wife's people is. She...he
married her in California. Paul married Mr. Lacy Sampson's daughter,
Pauline.
B: Is this the same Sampson family that the educators, Otis Sampson,
Oscar Sampson, is this the same family line here?
P: Corteat;. .;t...correct, yes, it's the same Sampson family line.
Uh, three other boys, I have ten boys...uh, nine boys. Nine boys and
five girls...makes the same amount of children in my family that
there was in my father's family. And...but three of them, the last
three is by another marriage, because my wife died when Howard, the
baby boy was two months old. And pretty near all of our friends
wanted us to give...give Howard away, so we could uh...so he could
have better care, but we never did, we always kept all of our
children together, and raised them together. But after I married erm
again, there're three other sons in the family now, and one named
Ray...Ernest Ray Brooks, the middle boy being Verle Brooks, Verle
Glenn Brooks, and the baby in our family today is David...David
Earl Brooks. And if I should live to see the twentyninth day of
next month, I'll be seventy-one years old. Born in the year of
1902, April the twenty-ninth. I'd like to give you...how much more
67
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...do we have there?
B: We've got plenty, don't worry about that, just all you'll tell me
about. The only thing I want you to talk to me about is some-
thing about the trend, or the way you have tried to maintain the
Indian identity within your teltd And what have you done as a
father to pass down your family history, and to try to instill
within your children to be passed on...Indian pride. Something about
the...
P: Well, first of all, my father was very close related to the Lowry
family. And he comes from the stock of Henry Barry. And to answer
Brenda's question about my identity of being an Indian. I've always
been an Indian first, and if I was ever a Democrat it was second.
And my political affiliations was always second. But pre...but
before each of...any of this, came my church affiliation. I've been
going to sunday school and church now for about forty years...
forty-five years, and I don't believe that...I also believe that I
could count the days...the Sundays rather, that I've missed, on my
...well, I'd say my fingers and my toes.
B: This is an interesting point about the -pe religious affiliation
the Lumbee Indians have. Back as far as we can find about our history,
this has been one of the ways, I feel, that uh, the power structure
has sort of kept Indians in a vacuum. You know, lots of times
because we felt like it was morally wrong, or that there was Biblical
68
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: ...teachings against doing certain things The whites allowed us
to learn religion, and learn these certain rules, but not education.
They wouldn't let the blacks preach in Robeson County. But they
would let Christians come in and teach Indians, and I feel that
maybe somewhere in the past this has been a handicap to us I
am as convinced as you that it's a very vital part of one's being
to have spiritual security. Do you...what do you think about the
religious influence on the Lumbee Indians in Robeson County?
P: Well I...really, I believe that uh, if it hadn't of been for...I
really believe we've been too strict in the religious part of it.
We took too many things for granted. We took too many hearsay. We
took too many I says and so forth.
B: And hasn't this been through the manipulation of whites, who have
allowed us to become...maybe the wrong word is brainwashed, but at
least, to put such emphasis on religion that we forget the whole
man?
P: I think that's right Brenda. What I'm...what I'm looking at here
is from...is in the year of 1835. From 1835 until 1885, the
Croitan Indians as we were known at that time, had no access to
education. And the only educational facilities available to the
Cherokee, that's the group of Indians in the western part of the
state, who live today on a reservation. We've never lived on a
reservation in Robeson County. Uh, facil...and the only educational
facilities available to the Cherokees was the mission schools
69
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...operated by thec,-the Society of Friends. Even the first public
school law was not passed in North Carolina until 1840. The policy
of the state with regards to Indian education has been inconti tent
since the early 1800s. Not only the early 1800s, it's been that way
since 1492, to be exact. The dis...the disfranchisement of Cherokees
was amended in 1889, requiring the Cherokees to attend government
schools, and not allowing them to be admitted to public schools. At
least, this provided them with access to an educational system, but
the Indians in eastern North Carolina were denied this opportunity
from 1835, the time of their disfranchisement, until uh, almost the
nineteenth century. Almost 1900 I should say. An entire period of
about 85 years, instead of fifty years.
B: Can we talk some about how the education of the Indian children was
left primarily to the parents, and because there was no starting
point for Lumbee Indians, even today, we still have the struggle
going on to beaer educate the Indian children in Robeson County.
P: It seems that there's no real reason for us to relate the history
of the struggle, because the history of the struggle was wrote by
white people, and it's not true altogether. Of the Indians in Robeson
County, to gain rec...recognition, at any level, much less their
continuous attempt to provide for an Indian education. However, some
facare necessary. In 1885 the General Assembly assumed the res-
ponsibility for the education of the Indians in Robeson County uh,
pertaining...op...operating...appropriating rather, five hundred
70
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...dollars per year for the support of the Croitan Indian School.
Now this appropriation was made after we would finish a school.
After we would, uh, go in the woods, and cut the logs, and saw the
timber, and put the school building up ourselves.
B: You had to have enough initiative to get something physical started
to show that maybe it would be worth the state's investww& five
hundred dollars to educate Indian children.
P: That's the truth, and at that time, the population of our group of
Indian people that was in Robeson County, I imagine was something
like...uh, possibly three thousand...three...three or four thousand
people. The General Assembly enacted legislation to establish a
normal school in Robeson County called Croitan Normal. However, the
law contained several rigid requirementst or the Croitan Indians
to meet in order to obtain, in order to establish rathe5 an educa-
tional institution...students had to be above fifteen years of age,
and sign a contract to teach at least one year before being allowed
to attend. And the five hundred dollars would be withdrawn if the
local people did not provide a building. Uh, it was not until 1921
that the legislature appropriated seventy-five thousand dollars
for a new and up to date building, the present Old Main, at Pembroke.
The first state orppraprted.-appropriation for Indian educational
facilities. This emanss-a.ean means simply that from 1837 until 1921,
the state did little to educate its India citizenry by providing
facilities and pfo e.nd programs for their Indian eean.constutientcy.
71
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: Constituency.
P: Constituency.
B: I'd like to change that date to 1973, because they've done only...
P: Done nothing yet.
B: Only what the law has forced to be done specifically...
P: Yeah that's...
B: Here in Robeson County.
P: That's mighty well spoken.
B: I wanted to ask you, uh, something about your long time concern about
education. You know presently we have a real...seemingly the hottest
political potato in the legislature concerning the Robeson County
school system. And I know that there are men, like your seventy years
of age, who've been trying to improve education for Indians in
Robeson County, and then your son specifically, Dr. Martin Brooks,
and Dr. Herbert Oxendine made a dynamic impact on trying to improve
the education. But somewhere in learning about my people. I've
learned that you were directly connected with the transportation of
Indian children to some of these community schools, even before they
could get to go to this normal school, they had to be transported.
Can you discuss that a little bit for me? When you came back here
perhaps with your wife, and with your first children?
P: I remember very well in 1931, when I returned back to Robeson County.
Uh, all the Indian people that I knew I was begging, and begging, and
begging for transportation to schools. And our schools were so
72
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...located in the county system, until we needed transportation more
than any other school system in Robeson County, of which we have
six school systems in the county. These other five is located in the
cities where that uh...the furthest, in 1931, that any school child
that had to walk in the city, wouldn't have been over a mile and
a half. And when they started us, we had to walk a mile and a half
before we could get to a bus. This is all true because I know, I...
I'm the first man that drove...the first man that drove an Indian
school bus. And in order to have that job, somebody had to have a
truck to haul the children on. And whenever I moved here from
Michigan, I moved my belongings on a truck, and I...I was very
fortunate to have the truck. And they said if we would furnish te
truck, a man and a truck, they would give us an old body so with a
days work or two of repairing this old body...I managed to get it
on my truck, and I hauled school children with it for one year.
B: Did the white, in quotes, have school buses?
P: Oh yeah.
B: Why did the Indians, or did you all ever have a campaign to get
a school bus for Indian transportation?
P: At this time...we were such a few in number, whenever you speak of
registered voters...we didn't know what it was then to register and
vote. Uh, our people was always led by two or three white Indians,
that cooperated a hundred penent, maybe a hundred and ten percent
73
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...sometimes with the white uh,...
B: Power structure?
P: Power structure,-and the white people. And they would go along with
just about anything at that time, that the whites told them they had
to.
B: Why would they cooperate with the whites, and victimize their own
race of people?
P: Well that's a...now that's...that's a long story. I don't know if I
could even...uh....
B: Were they given comfortable pos iions, and maybe their environment
was a little bit better than the majority of the Indian people, and
they may have forgotten where they came from?
P: Well I've heard tell of one person who said that he was oh, about
twenty years old before he knew he was an Indian, but I doubted that
very much. But it is true that uh...if you...I had...I had a brother.
I want to tell you about him. My oldest brother was...at the time-he
was twenty-six, he was made a school committee.
B: This is your brother...?
P: My brother Allen, he's dead now. Uh, being the...being the second
oldest in the family, and I'm the second...there's only one younger
than I am. There's such a spread of years between us, until I never
remember him whenever he was home. But I...I did know...I did know
that he was my brother, simply because that he was the oldest one
74
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...in the family, that was a...I mean the oldest brother in the
family, and he was always around whenever he was needed by the family.
And he was this kind of a man that uh...was this school committee,
not only was he a committejan, but he was...he generally always had
the chairmanship of the committee.
B: Who appointed this committee, or what did the committee do?
P: Now this committee was supposed to be appointed by the school
dis...by the school community. In other words, the...if they circ-
ulated a paper to get the committees...you could vote for anyone you
pleased...uh, out of a certain school...school community. And perhaps
the three that got the most votes would...would be the one that the
chairmanship would fall on.
B: But you never did...the Indians didn't have anything to do with
counting those marks that were put on the paper, and they usually
would put who they wanted it seems on these committees, because no-
body questioned the results, or had a part in counting the results.
Is that right?
P: Well anyway...there's an old...there's not an old saying, it's an
old truth. That, "The love of money is the root of all evil." So if
a...a man...man had a few dollars...with a very few dollars...uh the,
the chair...the man who was going to be chairman could be given uh,
two or three dollars so to speak, or maybe ten or fifteen dollars,
75
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...in order to pull with the uh, the structure. And this structure
to my knowledge has been...has been Democratic structure for the
past seventy-two years. And he was the kind of man that as long as
he was chairman, even when he got sick, he offered to give up, but
they says no, as long as you are here/and you're able to talk, we'll
come to your house. tAc'nm -- .
B: They meaning the community, or...?
P: No, I'm talking about the...the board of education. After that the
board of education would come to his house, and they would make their
plans for who to teach the schools, and also for who to be committees
of the school. Any committee could be put down, or ano...a new one
put up, as long as he was their chairman. And the power structure
ruled that school community through one man. And today they don't
even have that one man. The county board of education, rules every
Indian school in Robeson County today.
B: Now my impression of this chairman board...I want to be sure I'm
getting the right impression of...of your brother 14fe-. Is he what
we call the white Indian, because they could buy him off?
P: Well he wasn't only just a white Indian, he was just as white as any
of the white men. So whenever you...whenever you speak of it in
color, but he was also that person that would, uh, just liked to do
what they wanted him to do. If you want to call that a white Indian,
he's a white Indian.
76
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: He didn't really have the...what was good for the people at heart,
at all times, and all decisions he made didn't necessarily think
about the future of Indian children?
P: Well what I/wse saying too, again, is the fact that uh, it's only
been in late years...I'd say since 19...since 1954, when uh, the
Supreme Court of the United States made the ruling for everything
to be segregated in public sc...public education.
B: Integrated.
P: Integrated...integrated, in public education. And since then only,
and the life of some of those dear dear black people who have
given their all for the cause of their freedom, that the Indian
people havea known freedom. I'm seventy-one years old, and I
never knew until, uh, last November I believe it was, when we help-
ed...when...when there was held a civil ri...an Indian Civil Rights
B: Hearing.
P: Session here in Robeson County, and in particular, in the court
house of Lumberton...that Indian people had any rights hardly at
all. So it's not a question of going back, and uh, and seeing
where the...they'd...they'd been treated so mean, so long, until I
don't think they knew anything else.
B: They didn't question it because...something was said or done?
P: -Didn't question it.
77
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: Uh, we seemed some how to get off on interesting tangents every time
I ask a question it can easily lead into something else. But uh,
back to what I asked you about the allotment of school buses in the
county...
P: Oh yeah.
B: We got kind of on an interesting story, and I don't think you an-
swered my question.
P: Uh, at that time, in 1931, now I'm positive of this, there was only
two sections of our great Indian populations in Robeson County that
was asking for anything.
B: Being which sections?
P: Uh, Prospect section, and Saddle Tree section. Uh, the Prospect sec-
tion is made up of...uh, near about a hundred percent Indian. Uh,
Saddle Tree section was made up of about seventy percent And the
same year that I came home, uh, not the same year I came home
either. Uh, a year or two...yeah, a year or two ..well yeah, the
same year that I came home, there were people coming to high school
from Saddle Tree and Prospect, to the high school in Pembroke.
B: How did they get to these schools?
P: They walked or rode bicycles, or their parents pooled rides.
B: Did some of them sometimes have to live over here with relatives?
P: Yes. Yeah, that was a...a big part of the people, but some very dear
friends of mine that I knew on Saddle Tree uh, had begged and begged
78
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...and begged for help. And I believe there was about thirteen of
them that were coming over here to school.
END SIDE ONE, TAPE TWO
79
_________________
LUM 123AB
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
DATE: MARCH 27, 1973
TAPE: TWO
SIDE: TWO
P: Start another one?
B: No this is just the second side of that one. When we finish this
side, then this will be the completion of this interview.
P: How much time we still got?
B: Well, we've got plenty, if you want to take longer, I'11 put more
tapes on, but if you want to quit when we get this one, we'll just
talk about the school bus situation.
P: The school bus situation in...in North Carolina, in Robeson County
rather, in 1931 looked very bleak for the Indian people. Uh, they
had been begging and begging as I first said, and they were paying,
they were paying a little gasoline expense from Saddle Tree. And up
here at Prospect, there was a...a great big fellow up there named
Crawly Locklear, I'll never forget him. Uh, he went down, and J.R,
Poole was our county superintendent at that time.
B: He was elected by voters too, wasn't he?
P: No, he wasn't elected, he was just that kind of a man in that com-
munity that was trying to get something done.
B: J.R. Poole was elected.
P: Oh yeah, J.R. Poole.
B: By registered voteP
80
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BREMDA BROOKS
P: Well I don't know whether he was elected or not, but I imagine he
was. But even at that time, it didn't matter, the white people
elected everybody, and still does. We've only...begir ng to help
out a little bit. Or maybe break through in one place that I know
of. Three...wait a minute, three places. I know of three places t~
that the Indian vote has uh, done a pretty good job. And that was
in the Prospect section where they elected a county commissioner,
in the person of uh...
B: Herman?
P: Mr. Herman Dial. And over in the Burnt Swamp section, Mr....
B: Bobby Dean.
P: Bobby Dean Locklear. And I don't believe we can give full credit in
Saddle Tree section on our school board, because it's a different
set up when we come to the school sy...system. It's a county-wide
thing. And I think some of the whites got confused in her name.
She has a lovely home, but she's an Indian...she's a hundred percent
Indian lady.
SP: So now we...we...we're looking...going back to the bus situation,
and buses for children. Uh, whenever they began to get...be more
than the car...more than people wanted to pay the...half the ex-
pense perhaps, or maybe furnish the car and the county pay the ex-
pense of gasoline. Uh, we needed a bus so bad, until they just kept
right on hammering for a bus. And Mr. Poole, who was then the county
81
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...superintendent, finally told them at Saddle Tree, says, "Listen
we...we don't have enough of buses for ourselves yet. And besides,
if we had enough, if we give you one, the Negros would want one."
So you see the conditions of the Indian people until since 1958.
Well later than 1958, it...there was nothing done about the '58
situation until about '56 and '57, and nothing really done until
Martin Luther King got in there. And he's the first man I ever heard
talk about having a dream about, uh, educational facilities at
black people and minority groups, and for everybody, especially uh,
people who had been so put down in Robeson County. And...and we've
had very little so far, but we're beginning to uh...climb the ladder
just a little bit.
B: Now I'd like for you to give me a typical day's experience of your
bus driving route.
P': Hmrm.
B: Can you tell me exactly what...the kind of pay, after you were able
to get all the discarded parts of buses that may have been used by
white schools, and they were no longer useable, and they were put
on the junk pile, and you were able to put this bus together. What
kind of money did you get for transporting Indian children, and how
big an area?
P: Uh, I'd be afraid to say how much mileaghad, but I know it was a
pretty good mileage. And it was through...I didn't have no paved
82
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BRROKS
P: ...roads. The only paved road I had was P fftghlsli, 74 Highway
at that time. Uh this highway has been changed to 211 in Pembroke.
B: 711.
P: 711 through Pembroke. And it was Highway 74 at that time. And I
had about uh...let's see, about two miles and a half I reckon,
everyday on this highway on one of my trips. And the other trip was
through the mud and...and mud holes, and dirt roads.
B: You transported students from which communities into Pembroke
proper to attend school here? ct communities did you come from?
P: I took uh...the route to the...to the Kirby farm, down thrngh the
crossroads, uh...uh, one side of the road then was Deep Branch. I
never hauled any of the...any of the Deep Branch folks. We'd turn
then and come back to the...come back to the uh...brick station on
74. On...straight on to...to Moss Neck Mill Pond, and then I'd
cross Moss Neck Mill Pond, and uh...I believe then I came up through
the Henry Godwin section. And...
B: Uh, the numbers of these roads...currently, your route would be 711
toward Lumberton, then over to uh, Highway 74...now.
P: Um huh.
B: And you were traveling on what we call now the Chicken Road, and
the number is 1003. Then, from 74 you would come back across 711
*+ i-
asi -s numbered now, over to Moss Neck, and the road that goes
through the Godwin farm is 1563?
P: 1563 I believe it's named now. I don't believe I came back through
83
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...there. I believe I went on up and uh, and took in the Neilk and-
BugaklPrs... (?)
B: Is that up from...on 74 towards Maxton?
P: No l -J)OSA V-
B: Well after you got over to Highway 74...
P: 74...we went on across Moss Neck you see, and went on out by uh...
B: After what...the road that is now 72? The road that it...that goes
down through the Mt. Airy sectionz--7
P: Yeah, down 72, and then back through the \o kA/ center, and
then back into Pembroke.
B: So how many miles can we generally estimate from...for this one
route...now this was made daily...so from Pembroke over to what is
now 74?
P: No, not now 74...I'd go down here through the Kirby farm, through
the...through the McCormick farm to the river.
B: Alright, that...instead of the now 74, you would take the route
NO
from Pembroke, down what iskJones Street Extension, to the Deep
Branch Road, 1339, you would go back to the intersection of Chicken
Road...
P: That's right.
B: Which is 1003.
P: Um huh.
B: And from there you would go across what is now 711, you would go
84
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PBTER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: ...through the Moss Neck Swamp, and then to what is now 72, and
turn towards the presently existing Union Chapel School.
P: Um huh.
B: Then you got to the intersection of Union Chapel School, which is
uh, 1515, road number, you would turn back to Pembroke, and again
you would cross Highway 72 at Maynor brothers Ere.-
P: Um huh.
B: And then on into Pembroke on what is now...
P: No. I wouldn't cross...I wouldn't...I...I'd be on 72 and leave it
see...
B: Right...
P: Um huh.
B: You would cross 72 on what is now 1563...is the road number, into
Pembroke.
P: Well I would say I had about uh...
B: Now is this the only trip you made daily?
P: No, I made two trips. Did two trips daily, and I don't just remember
how the other trip lies now see?
B: But this was to cover this one particular community, and then you
went in another community area. Every morning?
P: Every morning, and back again in the evening.
B: So that's actually two round trips daily?
P: Yeah. And then the second year I hauled school children...school
children to Union Chapel. I only had one load there. And then I
85
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...brought a load of uh...college people, not...not, not exactly
college people, it was normal people...the two year normal course.
I had about, I believe it was seventeen or eighteen, something
like that, that I would bring out from Chapel area to the college,
and then back to Chapel. I lived over there.
B: And this type of transportation is now practiced, where the...the
children from the same household...they meet at the elementary
school, and then those going on to a higher institution of education
would change buses at that point, and then transported all the way
to...
P: No, we didn't have that kind of system then. See, this is the only
high school that we had. Everything was elementary. We didn't...we
didn't have no high schools, except that...
B: But uh, to get a clarification on the children that you would bring.
Would you take some to Chapel, and then you would pick up others at
Chapel, or they just remained on the bus?
P: No, no...well if I could bring them I'd...I'd...if I could bring
somebody that was waiting on the road...I believe I had one or two
that always waited for me, because I wasn't loaded. And if I wasn't
loaded I could bring them you see. But you know, you could always
squeeze in one more.
B: Umh...
P: I...I'm saying it was already full, but you could squeeze in another one.
86
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: How many children would your bus carry?
P: Uh, that bus...I...I've counted fifty-two off of it a million times.
B: Fifty-two children?
P: Fifty-two and forty-eight, and any...anywhere from thirty-eight to
fifty-two
B: And what kind of a annual school term did you have? How many months
of the year did you...?
P: Eight months.
B: Eight months. And do you think the school attendance in those years
was commendable for the progress the Indians had made, or what is
your response to that?
P: I think so. I think for the...for the progress...for the advancement
we have made I think it was commendable. Simply because that...there
was nothing like a free lunch, there was nothing like a...a whole
lot of the things that you have in school today. Everything that
you had come from your home. And that was very little in a lot of
the homes...very little.
B: Uh, now I wanted you to...let's go back from another question we
rambled a little bit from that I wanted you to talk to me about.
Is some of the input you have had in the formation of maybe the
teL
ideals and standards, and the kind of thinkingyou have tried to
instill into your sons and daughters. To make real men and women
out of them, what kind of things or tactics did you approach the
87
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: ...responsibility of a father, and to make it a little bit more
difficult, an Indian father? What about your children's education
and the value that you tried to impress upon them? After you came
back, tell me something about the elementary education of your
children, and what you did to encourage this, and how successful
you may have been?
P: Well uh, going back to...I...I would have to go back to the time
before I had any children to maybe explain this simply because in
1919 whenever I went to uh, a different state to live, uh, I found
different attitudes. I'll never re-rtr T'11 tev.e forget the
night that I got off the train in Petersburg, Virginia. Having never
been out of Robeson County before, it was really surprising for me
to see colored people in the waiting...in the xestvtwau in the
waiting room...or colored people in the waiting room. And from this,
I begin to realize that uh, not only was I changing places, but I
was in chan...I was...I was changing environmental things. What I'm
saying is, that uh, life wasn't the same in the other place.
B: You mean they were more humane like, or more....
P: They were more humane, they were more...they were more uh, friendly,
they were more willing to help you to do something. I remember once
whenever I went for a job, and uh, I had some experience in machines,
but not enough to...to say I was a qualified machinist. And whenever
I saw that I was going to have to tell the truth to the foreman...I
says, "Well now Mr. Robinson," I says, "I want to tell you the truth,
88
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...I don't want to...I don't want to do anything else but be truth-
ful, and be a good worker if I may work for you." And I says, "I'm
not able to do your work by blueprint, but if you will simplify it,
I've got enough experience that I'm pretty sure I'll make you a
good worker." And he looked at me right in the eye, and says, "Well
Brooks," he says, "we all had to learn, and I'm willing to give you
a chance." So that's the kind of environment I worked in, and which
may...even today you don't have that chance here in Robeson County.
Uh, what they want you to do...what...what they hold up before you
is that you haven't the experience. Well, somebody had to learn them
you see. Uh, in other words, the whole set-up here has been that
Indian people couldn't learn to do nothing but to plow and ditch and
cut wood and work with their hands. Even...even, I...I know even one
doctor who was a Lowry, that when he graduated from college, he asked
for where he could go to...to further his education. And the super-
intendent of our schools at that time told him that there was nowhere
for him to go, and the thing he would have to do, would be to teach
school for his people. So it's always been a second rate society for
Indian people in Robeson County. And...and seems like uh, politically
now, you see, it's going to make it about a third or fourth rate.
Uh, what I'm saying is, uh, since the days of uh, 1958, and Martin
Luther King, and...and so many of the other colored people who had
education that come along and...and demanded things for their people,
89
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...and they have gotten them. And I...I see know on televisions...on
the television screen every once in awhile, where the white people
are even...even kissing the...the colored people. They're taking all
the...the leading part in baseball, football, basketball, and act-
ing on the stage. And I don't see this happening for Indian people
for a long time yet. Now...
B: About your children now?
P: I want to go back to my family. Going away from this state in 1919,
and going, and being...and becoming aquainted with people from every
state in the union nearby, I know there was Tennessee, uh, Kentucky,
Miss...Mississippi, Arkansas, Virginia, West Virginia, and Maryland,
well practically every state in the union was represented where I
worked. And I got along with everybody, and had friends with all the
people. Some of the best friends we ever had was our next door
neighbors. Uh,
nection with other people, and learning what other people done, have
given me the...the privilege to try to keep my...my children busy.
If it wasn't with a book, with his daily cho...chores that he was
supposed to do, in order that he might help out on the farm. And this
is what I think has...has been the thing, if I have made any success
to Robeson County, and I'm now paying about a thousandia year for
taxes, and I think I have...I think that uh, by leaving here and
90
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...coming back, and...and keeping my family together...uh, with
inspiration, and education it...it caused them to do as much as
they have done. And that's not very much, considering there's
fourteen of them.
B: Well it looks like you're not going to tell me specifically any of
the things, but of your fourteen children, how many of your children
have completed a four year college program or higher? Can you tell
me the names, or at least maybe tell me how high....
P: Uh, let's start with the boys first, and then I will...we will try
to finish up. I have uh...I have three boys that have finished
college, and have done work towards uh, higher education. One of
them becoming a doctor, uh...a medical doctor, and one a druist,
a registered pharmacist, and then I've got one now that's uh, in
school for his PhD. And the girls, I've got one that's a mas...has
a Master's Degree in Reading, and she's teaching in the schools of
Michigan. And I have two daughters, Bernice, and Joyce that has uh,
college educations. Five in all that have college educaitons, and I,
I would have...if all of them would have went...sent every one of
them to college. And I just believe I would have done it, because
that was my goal in life, to give them all a college education.
B: You have one son who is finishing college?
91
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: Wait, wait a minute.'..wait a minute, I've got uh...I've got...I've
got four sons, uh finished college, and another one, the baby boy,
is in his second year, and the boy inbetween, Verle Glenn, whenever
he finished high school, he didn't want to go no more, and he's a
brick layer. 4
B: And then Ernest Ray has gone.
P: Yeah, Ernest Ray makes the fourth one...fourth boy.
B: So.you have four sons who have finished college, one son who is in
his second year, a daughter who has her Master's in Reading, and
teaching in Michigan schools, and two daughters who are certified
teachers, and one of them is teaching in schools that we have very
few Indian population because she's a good teacher, and they wanted
her talents over there. Uh, I'd like to have you just tell me some-
thing about, maybe the struggle financially, if you had a struggle,
rearing your children, and having such a success in educating those
of your children who would take advantage of it. We can start for
example with uh...withsDr. Brooks. He was in school here, in the
elementary system?
P: Yes, he was, at that time, at the time he was supposed to finish
school here, we only had the eleventh grade...we didn't have the
twelfth grade added then. And back when he was finishing the eighth
grade, we had a little...always had a little uh, program for clos-
ing for the children. And one of them was a declamation contest,
92
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...which was known as the speaking contest, and he entered that
contest, and won the contest. And after that happened, he always
kept it up that he wanted to be a doctor. And I watched him for
three years through the eighth, ninth, and tenth, and he was very
smart. Uh, in fact I've had quite a few of his teachers tell me
that he was the only...about the only student, that he...that they
had that they dreaded. And he says, "He always makes me study."
He'd ask them questions, and they'd have to dig to find out the
answer so they could give it to him. So...and one of them teachers
is a good teacher too, Mr. Danford Dial. He had him in the eighth
grade, and the ninth grade, and the tenth grade. And he's told me
a many of time that...eh, well...there's several more...there's two
or three more, but there's two of them that was always girls. And
always when a girl and a boy is in competition together if the boy
is a little bit better, and not enough that everybody can see it,
the...the prize will go to the girl. You see what I mean?
B: Um huh.
P: And uh, he happened up to this after he left here. I told him one
day, I says, "Son if you still want to be a doctor maybe you better
go somewhere else and finish your eleventh grade. Maybe it would
be an advancement for you. Maybe it'll be...maybe it'll be just the
thing that'll cause you to get in med-school." And this is what
happened. At this time, my oldest daughter was living in Michigan,
93
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: And I wrote her a letter to find out if she was uh...willing to take
care of him in school. And she says, "Yes, send him on. Send him on
up here." And he went up there, and he made valedictorian of a class
of 139. And there was something like seventeen that didn't pass their
grades. And he only had one year in that school, and made the
valedictorian. And this is the thing that uh...give him a recom-
mendation to the University of Michigan. One of the best schools,
one of the best med schools in the country.
B: Did he have to do any remedial work to get because he came from
the inferior school in Robeson County?
P: No...no, no...no...no intermediate work at all. He was just ahead,
as I told you, Danford Dial said he was the only student that ever
made him scratch his head a lot. And uh, he came out as valedictorian
of that class. Now I'm not telling you what I thought, or what...
somebody said, I was there, and seed it, whenever he graduated. And
the principal of that school, I'm sorry I can't tell you his name now,
I've forgotten it, but because of this he give him a, uh, a whole-
hearted recommendation to the University of Michigan. And by the way,
that's the only way you can get in that school even today...is by a
recommendation. And he went there and took his pre-med work, and he
didn't
4 T edtdn't, get in med school whenever he was ready, but never the
less he didn't give up. He took a course in medical technology, and
94
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...got a degree in that, which took him a little over two years.
And then, they says, "Well Brooks looks like he's going to stay
around here right on." And says, "We're going to let you get in
med school this time." Now before this...before this happened
though, back here at home, I had went to every politician that I
knew, and even to my brother that was such a politician in the
schools, to help me to get him in somewhere here. And I don't be-
lieve there was ever a letter wrote to no...to none of the schools.
Although they told me they were doing all they could. I never heard
from anything of it anyhow. And whenever that...whenever he finished
that medical technology .they said,"Now..." And he was working too,
and the school...he, he carried a full load after his first six
months in med...in med school. He didn't...he didn't work any for
six months, but after that he carried a full load in the hospital,
and whenever he was, uh...put in med school...whenever he was put
in med school, they told him he couldn't work. But after six months,
his grades was up with the rest of them. In fact, he was among the
...he was...I believe he was among about the first ten in his class.
About ten in his category. Because in that situation, he was doing
a...he was doing research work on cancer. And his work was judged
to be the best in any school in the United States. And he received
an award that carried five...a five hundred dollar prize...uh, prize
95
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...for the best, uh, research program of any student in...in the
United States, in that year. And the Borden Milk Company is the
one that furnished this money. We just...we want to go back now
to the first six months of his med school, in which uh, they told
him he wouldn't be able to work anymore. And previously, uh,
Brenda asked me about the finance. I'll tell you what, finance
was a problem. With...when you've got eleven children, and most
of them in school, and no mother with them, aha makes it a big-
ger problem. But I always had friends...always had good friends.
Uh, I went to Mr. Raymond Hendrix a many of time, and..."Uh,
Raymond I want to borrow fifty dollars." Or if I wanted to bor-
row a hundred dollars, and he'd...he'd say well...I says, "I'll
pay it back to you so and so." Never give him a paper in my life,
and he'd give me the money. And every time Martin has ever sent
to me for money for school purposes...he always got it even if I
had to borrow it and give a mortgage on something. But I'm...I'm
pretty glad today that uh, them mortgages and deed of trusts have
always...all been paid up. And I want to tell you something else.
If you pay a debt, you'll have friends. If you borrow money from
a man and you pay him, you can generally go back and get another
one. Sometimes he'll ask you to loan you money. I've had that
happen to me. Whenever he...after that first six months in med
96
SUBJECT: DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...school, they said, "Well Brooks, if you want to now, you can
go back to work again." And you know what he was doing whenever
he left...whenever.. .whenever he left there? He was administering
oxygen to the...to the university hospital in...of the University
of Michigan. There was three of them. He worked one eight hours
and the other two fellows worked their particular eight hours.
And he always had time enough that he had a book along with him,
studyi4tg-e@.. And I want to tell you another thing that he's
told he several times, and I know it's the truth because we never
didn't pay no out-of-state tuition, and they never even brought
it up to him until he got his...until he got through his...his
uh...his pre-med work. And whenever he got through his pre-med
work...they brought him...no, his...his...his whole college work.
And whenever they brought it up to him, he told them that he did-
n't have...fourteen -hundred dollars I believe is what it run to
at that time...his...his out-of-state tuition.
B: Why was he...if he had been in school there year as a...as a
student in the high school level, why was he required to pay out
of state tuition? What kind of...
P: That's what I can't tell you. But uh, he was confronted with that
bill whenever he went to pick up his...what do you call it?
B: His grades, or his...
P: When he went to pick up his diploma. Whenever he went to get his
credentials for his...
97
SUBJECT DR. FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
B: For having completed med school?
P: Yeah, for having done everything.
B: Then they raised the question of...
P: Then they raised the question of the tuition...of the out-of-state
tuition. And he says, "Well," he says, "I'll just have to give it
up because I don't have that kind of money, and I know my dad do-
n't." But I imagine, somehow or another I would have get it...got
it up for him. But uh, they sent him to, and this...this lady who
was talking to him, told him, he says, "I'm going to send you to
see another...a...a man." And the-only.reas...way he ever told me
about the man was, that he was the mouthpiece for the uni...for
the whole university of the state of Michigan. And whenever he
talked with this particular man, and they wanted to know how he
had got through med school, and he told him about how he had work-
ed, and how that my daddy had...his daddy had uh helped him all
he could. He turned to him and says, "Well if you were that
interested in your education, he says I'm going to give you this
bill. And that's the only reason why there wasn't fourteen more
hundred dollars added to all that I had ever done for him in
school. And by and by, I had told him that if he ever got in med
school, and I knew that he'd be there four years...you weren't
going to get kicked out is what I meant...I would go there and
build him a house to cut down the ninety-five dollars a month
98
SUBJECT: DR: FULLER LOWRY
MR. PETER BROOKS
INTERVIEWER: BRENDA BROOKS
P: ...rent that we were saying away'back'yonder.
B: And during the time now...we've missed something...during the time he was in school
he got married?
P: During...before he...before he finished his...his uh, pre-med work he got married.
And I was about to throw him away at that time, and tell him I wouldn't be able to
help him no more, simply because always-iheepromised-melhe would...he would go
through school, and come back home to practice, and that's where he is today.
But after I thought about it, and while I was thinking about it, he wrote me a
letter and told me hew much he appreciated the help I had done...given him, and
he says it will only take me longer to do what I intend to do...but he says,
I'll do it...I'll get through sometimes...says, I don't know how long it will
take me. Well whenever that happened, you know how a father's heart gets melted
down. And it was about Christmas time when this happened. And I sent him a fifty
dollar bill for a special Christmas gift. And he made it on through school. And
I remember one or two fellows that I got aCuainted with while he was in med
school. And one of them was the son of the...of the uh...head surgeon at the,
at the general...at the Wayne County General Hospital in Detroit. And this son
of the...of this man who was the head surgeon, failed to the extent that he
had to go back over som,-efohis work. And Martin came out with flying colors,
and I was looking whenever he received his medical degree also. And you talk
about uh...a problem...it ha been a problem, but as I said previously, if
you're the type of man that works, pays your just debts, and got some friends,
you'll have some friends to help you.
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