Audio Transcript

Mary Frederickson

When you first went to work in the mill, what was it like? Were you afraid to go, or were you excited about going?

Flossie Moore Durham

Well, I tell you, when I first went to work, it changed at one o’clock. At one o’clock in the day that morning shift would go off, and the evening shift come on, and each one had to work twelve hours.

Mary Frederickson

So when did the morning shift go to work, at one in the morning?

Flossie Moore Durham

Monday morning they went to work at four o’clock. Now I’ve worked on every one of them shifts when I was a girl. And then Monday morning the morning shift would go to work at four o’clock, and they’d work till one in the day. The evening shift come in at one in the day, and they worked till one that night. And then the morning shift come in at one that night and worked till one the next day, and they done that all week.

Mary Frederickson

When you were ten years old, you did that? You would work that long?

Flossie Moore Durham

Yes. And they didn’t make anything, neither, a little along them days.