1970, THE MOUNTAIN PEOPLE, SOUTHERN APPALACHIA ~ Office Of Image Archeology

Apr 1, 2020
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This film explores the true meaning of poverty in Southern Appalachia.

Transcript:

0:12
not hillbillies if you want to be
0:15
friends mountain people and getting to
0:19
know them isn't easy especially now when
0:22
things are stirring in the mountains of
0:24
Tennessee I found them enormously
0:26
generous and hospitable but very
0:28
suspicious at first very suspicious
0:31
indeed of strangers and cameras and
0:34
things they weren't used to and in fact
0:37
the Canadian filmmaker was shot around
0:39
here a couple of years ago so Mike Clark
0:43
acted as our guard a man deeply stirred
0:47
by the poverty and isolation of his
0:49
friends I once asked him why he'd come
0:52
back to help the mountain people when he
0:54
could obviously have got himself a good
0:56
job in town and he replied anger this is
1:06
my house it's a mr. Barry Cole camp here
1:11
but it's all deserted now we're quiet
1:18
and peaceful around here
1:21
[Music]
1:40
I was raised Easter here in the high
1:51
mountains I went away to college for
1:55
three years people came into these
2:01
mountains two hundred years ago and they
2:03
were scotch and Irish and English they
2:06
were looking for freedom and
2:07
independence and in many ways they found
2:11
it was a good live a hard life for the
2:14
good one about 60 years ago big industry
2:24
began to move in the railroads coal
2:28
companies the timber companies most of
2:32
the mountains now are owned by big
2:34
business by the Rockefellers and the
2:36
DuPont's and the melons and by the
2:40
federal government I mean the people
2:43
don't have much at all we may place it
2:47
on much land take Christine Brennan for
2:51
example he's a small farmer he owns
2:54
about 20 acres and he works very hard
2:57
but he's just barely able to get by
3:01
there are 10 million people scattered
3:04
through the hills and the valleys of
3:06
Appalachia an area roughly the size of
3:09
Britain and these mountains contain the
3:13
largest concentration of poor whites in
3:15
this country Velma Brennan there's
3:19
another one he's a sharp property he
3:21
doesn't know anything to go and at all
3:23
he raises his corn in tobacco well I
3:26
don't I want to say it it would get any
3:29
better but I don't see how I could get
3:30
any workers low income is not what we
3:35
are we're perfect I think low income is
3:38
people that maybe has a way of just
3:41
getting bad but poor people is the ones
3:44
that don't know where the next dollars
3:47
coming from I feel like that
3:52
that I'm just about as low as anybody in
3:56
in this county are any other kid I don't
4:01
have a home and also I've got a
4:08
large-size family and I don't have no
4:12
job and I don't have no income other
4:16
than maybe the little tobacco crop or
4:19
something I'd say approximately well all
4:25
the way total say what I call take-home
4:29
pay $800 a year this is a friend of mine
4:34
who live nearby David Davis
4:37
he also rents his land although he looks
4:40
very mild he's pretty tough man he's the
4:43
kind of man you want on your side boy in
4:45
a fight that I were talking to a man
4:50
that was would be called middle income
4:53
man he had a farm he had his own house
5:01
he had a school bus and he was driving
5:05
for the county and I was working trying
5:09
to help support people and he told me
5:11
that he said you can't help them people
5:15
and I said why can't you help
5:18
he said they won't help yourself he said
5:21
they won't work I said how do you know
5:25
that these people won't work he said
5:28
because I can't get him to work for me
5:31
and I said how much are you offering to
5:38
pay these full people he said four
5:42
dollars a day and I said four dollars a
5:46
day from sunup to sundown on the farm he
5:49
said yes that's right I said hail that
5:52
slave labor no wonder nobody won't work
5:55
for you
6:06
[Music]
6:17
[Music]
6:40
swing intern Jubilee hire close
6:56
that's lettuce what it means you really
7:18
want enough come on tell me
7:21
Isabel Phyllis Malcolm Bobby
7:27
Sharon David Cynthia darling
7:31
Lara Georgia and Jim and don't learn
7:38
Jubilee
7:39
[Music]
7:42
you have to teach him how to wash when
7:45
you get hooked up with it I'm not
7:47
hooking up with me I got her up this
7:56
morning
7:57
calendar early though I called her two
8:01
times second time I called her here she
8:05
went back with the covers pretending she
8:07
was just out of bed and I go back to
8:09
hitch his breakfast how many hours a
8:12
week you think you put in on that over
8:14
that machine
8:22
I'd say 28 to 30 hours a week
8:31
believe it or not and not too much a lot
8:38
of things at home had five borned at
8:59
home seven in the hospital
9:02
what did it cost $35 each for the one in
9:07
the home except one it was fun evening
9:13
just about suppertime I told everybody
9:16
go get the doctor so he goes into town
9:18
after the doctor and the doctor hadn't
9:22
eat supper and he said will I have time
9:26
to eat supper and Emma said oh yes go
9:28
ahead got plenty of time and well while
9:33
he's waiting for him then
9:35
Malcolm was born and here he come in 30
9:41
minutes later and got everything fixed
9:45
up and he only charged $25 that tummy
9:49
knocks up there
9:51
I guess you could say that we are a
10:23
violent people that we've always tried
10:27
to solve our problems with the gun and
10:30
the knife I later got him in court and
10:37
they swore false statements again loaded
10:41
swore alive get him to try to convict
10:44
him so he he beat the case and he had a
10:51
sister that was there in court with him
10:56
and she had a 45 automatic in her purse
10:59
and when the trial was over the
11:05
policeman's was not the first ones to
11:08
come out of the courthouse so him and
11:11
his sister walked out on the courthouse
11:15
lawn who steps away from the door
11:20
and when he taken his sister's purse and
11:28
when the two policeman's walked out of
11:31
the door onto the steps he shot down
11:34
both of them not on the steps
11:39
you remember we passed through a little
11:42
community several days ago called
11:43
Davidson all that in 1932 was the scene
11:49
of a very vicious cold strike and my
11:54
neighbors who were involved in the
11:55
strike tell about a man named Barney
11:58
Graham strike was on and Barney was one
12:05
of the leaders and the company brought
12:08
in two gun thugs to kill Barney and
12:12
everyone knew it one Sunday morning
12:16
Barney was on the way to get a doctor
12:18
his wife was sick and they caught him
12:21
and Main Street and shot him down he
12:25
always carried a pistol and he tried to
12:28
use the pistol but one of the bullets
12:30
and hit him in his arm and he couldn't
12:33
use the pistol so he told him I guess
12:38
you've got me boys and they
12:40
pistol-whipped him and killed him on the
12:42
Main Street and they were gambling and
12:46
misc nightclub in his brother got in a
12:51
fight with a man then they got down on
12:54
the floor a fight and Rosco thought this
12:59
guy was going to kill his brother I
13:02
think maybe the guy's got a knife out of
13:04
his pocket and he shot this man on top
13:08
of his brother than 45 automatic and he
13:11
went for his phone to God and hit his
13:14
brother and killed him kill Bertha
13:22
so that's the kind of climate we have in
13:25
the mountains whether or not our
13:28
problems here of poverty and jobs and
13:31
individual rights can be solved on
13:33
violence I don't know David Davison I
13:37
think they probably can't but most
13:40
people here wouldn't agree with us
13:44
[Music]
13:58
[Music]
14:29
[Music]
14:53
that we felt like if we all got together
14:56
and said together we could accomplish
14:59
these things that the poor people could
15:02
you know make away for their selves and
15:04
not have to look to the higher-income
15:07
for a way of living if you can get
15:11
enough of these low-income people poor
15:14
people together you can you can get just
15:26
about anything you won't know those
15:29
won't have to wake up when it grew the
15:32
people a number of people sticks
15:35
together
15:36
you can't do nothing wooden there are
15:42
all kinds of schemes in its country for
15:44
eliminating poverty and the federal
15:47
government spends billions of dollars
15:49
every year but most of it goes into the
15:52
pockets of the bureaucrats and the local
15:55
politicians very little that money ever
15:58
gets down here to the poor people
16:00
now all just once a year they come
16:02
around call my Center tell us two years
16:04
when they elected they come around
16:06
promises ething butts in getting office
16:08
they never do know anything about same
16:10
thing over again
16:12
now about this government program well
16:15
they never do get to the pool of man
16:17
that's my judgment it all lines up from
16:20
the big man hands about 90% of the
16:23
little man gets about ten I never seen
16:27
them it except at election time they
16:31
were a few of them come around you
16:34
didn't care about what happens to people
16:35
or anything well it no they really don't
16:38
care what what happens to the people but
16:40
they're really it's it that people are
16:44
getting together and trying to do for
16:46
theirselves instead of running to them
16:47
for everything they
16:54
I'll be me why that's a nice name came
17:35
to it why is that now a lot of people in
17:47
the mountains can read and write the
17:50
teachers won't work with them
17:51
the teachers are willing to work with
17:53
the rich kids are the kids they think of
17:56
grab potential are the ones I think
17:58
they're going to that's going to college
18:00
but not the poor kids not the kids that
18:05
don't have anyone to push them along or
18:07
to help them loosely prevalent at town
18:16
pull them they'll just pull that right
18:18
there and pull this in through pull them
18:21
like at now ain't little need to put
18:25
this on tighter you pull on this string
18:26
places that move there that's one time
18:32
sit back next to that done boy well I
18:35
gotta stay I guess sometimes it takes a
18:42
little more time for sometimes it does
18:44
Alice to learn while you're Young's time
18:47
learn or get old I can get busy
18:51
something else knew about the time now
18:58
you get about 15 years old you need to
19:00
be scratching there that lesson many of
19:03
the mountain schools are really
19:04
horrible a lot of the kids can't read
19:06
and write over half the kids who start
19:09
school don't finish in this County
19:11
there's a special room for slower
19:14
backward children which the teachers
19:16
call a nutty room and then all kinds of
19:20
scandals throughout the mountains were
19:21
funds for children's hot lunches are for
19:24
school programs I've been diverted into
19:26
politicians pockets
19:28
[Music]
19:45
recently some of the people here got
19:48
together and agreed that they wanted to
19:51
raise some money to help in the
19:52
community so the men thought they would
19:56
make rocking chairs for sale and the
19:58
women would sew handmade quilts this
20:02
looks like a small beginning or a small
20:04
thing but for the mountains it's it's
20:07
awfully important because the people
20:10
decided that no big shot there are no
20:13
federal government is really going to
20:14
help them if anything is done don't have
20:16
to do it themselves and they're going to
20:18
stand up and defend their rights I feel
20:22
that the white people has learned more
20:27
in the past few year from the colored
20:31
people than they ever were in the past
20:34
two or three hundred years that the
20:40
black people has proven to the world
20:43
that a man has to fight for his freedom
20:48
a lot of people don't believe in
20:51
violence I don't believe in violence
20:54
unless it's necessary the government
20:59
they say they don't believe in violence
21:02
but if necessary they will declare a war
21:07
again another country so that's the same
21:11
thing that they're fighting for the
21:12
freedom of the country so the man that
21:16
the poor man is going to have to fight
21:18
for his freedom
21:26
in 70 model Chevrolet at J&J Chevrolet
21:30
company in games for now I want to say
21:38
to you people everywhere
21:39
you ought to see that crowd when we say
21:41
we believe in crime in this and decency
21:44
in law and order and we support the
21:46
police and folks we support to Pentagon
21:49
you know it's a strange thing when you
21:51
say you're in favor of a strong military
21:54
stance I want it on the record and on
21:58
what everybody's a know that this
21:59
fundamental preacher understanding what
22:02
the Bible says about evil and how it
22:04
moves in on aggression I'm in favor of
22:07
our having the strongest military
22:09
establishment that the world knows
22:11
anything about last night ladies and
22:13
gentlemen out there in western
22:14
Pennsylvania Franklin out in the county
22:17
Neil the cannon farm and we had a great
22:19
time last night and I think one of the
22:21
most thrilling moments was while I was
22:24
speaking ladies and gentlemen five deer
22:26
came out of the woods and stood back
22:29
there and they wiggled their ears and
22:31
they bowed their heads they said amen to
22:34
victory and they went back the question
22:40
I keep asking is do we have enough time
22:45
and people all over the country are
22:49
talking about chaos and an end of the
22:53
American Way of life I don't know I just
23:02
don't know
23:22
[Music]