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The People Who Lived on the Land that is Now Redstone Arsenal, page 298
Some of the big plantation owners didn't like it though, because they already had good tenant farmers living on their land, and they didn't want to lose their tenant farmers. You would have to get an application, fill it out, and get accepted, but you would have to keep it a secret from the plantation [where you were a tenant farmer], or you would have trouble before you could move. People like Tom Young and the Fleming Boys did not want you to take their tenants, so you had to find out what church they [the tenant farmers] attended and go talk to them there. Walter gave an example of one such house that was built on the parcel shown as A-1 on the Army Real Estate Map. [Elnora Lanier described this house and said it was on the corner of Patton Road and Bob Wallace Avenue. The Army took that land in 1941, but it is no longer part of Redstone Arsenal.] Walter stated: Elnora Lanier's daddy [Roosevelt Clay] owned it. It was a two-story house built according to the size family on FHA standard. They put out orchards, chicken house, barn, corral for hogs. When the Army took over the land, they used the existing house as offices and [the barn] as a riding stable. Community Relations and Social Interaction Youth and Informal Social Control. Walter stated firmly: “You didn't do anything in the neighborhood. Anybody else saw you do something??"your parents knew.” The Community Bond. Walter said in the community, friends and neighbors and relatives helped each other, especially the elderly: Until Roosevelt, there was no Social Security. Everybody looked out for each other. You supported your elderly parents. Grandchildren (us) made the crop so Uncle [Buster] would have money. We took the crop to the co-op gin. Walter mentioned earlier that when he and the other boys went fishing, they would take some fish home and then take some to elderly people. Interaction between Black People and White People. In initial contact with the interviewer, Walter made statements about the racial prejudice he had encountered during his younger years when he lived in the Pond Beat community through the time he returned to the area and applied for work on the arsenal. In this case, his comments about occurrences that extended beyond 1941 were included because they had a bearing on his perspective of Redstone Arsenal. Most of those comments have been presented in previous sections in the context of the topic being discussed. Not included in this manuscript are his experiences as an industrial arts teacher at Councill 298 - (4331)