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The People Who Lived on the Land that is Now Redstone Arsenal, page 291
In other words, if the tenant charged 25 cents worth and had a dollar of credit, six months later that 25 cents had become 50 cents taken out of his dollar. Fishing. [Did you go fishing?] When the river got up, there would be a lot of flooding down there [in Pond Beat] and a lot of fish got into the ponds. Then the water would recede, and the fish would be trapped in those ponds. Men would put chicken wire over the holes (channels) to keep them back in the ponds. [Natural fish weirs!] There were all sizes of ponds. Some were so close to the river we could tell when the river was up because the water would rise in blue holes [sink holes]. They'd go dry about August. We would seine Rock Pond by the house. We were teenagers. We'd divide up the fish and give some to the older people as well. The Doctor. Walter Joiner said, “My mother had things pretty good. Dr. Duncan, he was old, came 15 miles out when my brother had an epileptic seizure. Churches. Walter said there were twin churches, Center Grove and Cedar Grove. They were Methodist churches. The first Cedar Grove Church was made of logs, but it was rebuilt. There was a Church at the end of Patton Road. The Gaines church was where the old Headquarters was. Baptism. Walter said, “The ford just above the bridge, between McDonnell Creek and where Huntsville Spring Branch comes in, is where people were baptized. This was identified as Horton's Ford. The Mail. Some people had to walk three miles just to get the mail. At the Farley School there was a bunch of mailboxes for everyone in the neighborhood. Walter said, “In the evening, I had to ride a horse three miles to get the mail.” School. Walter explained that the schools on the pre-arsenal land that were for Black children had only the lower grades, not high school: The school was down the road. The road used to be just a dirt road with a few houses on it and the school was right back up there. It was Horton School [F-265] Yancy Horton gave the land for it. They used to call where the Horton School was Jamar Hill, because the stickers would get on their feet. The researcher asked Walter Joiner what stickers getting on their feet had to do with the hill being called Jamar Hill. Walter asked her, “You don't know what a jamar is?” When she said she did not, Walter said, “Jamars are small, round burrs.” The researcher is interested in local names for things, and likes to learn a new one, so she recorded this in her notes. She does not doubt that the hill on which Horton School set 291 - (4324)