Cotton to Silk Oral History Project
Interview with Lee P. Graves
Conducted on March 13, 2013, by Sheree Scarborough
SS: Today is March 13—your birthday—2013. I’m Sheree Scarborough and I’m interviewing Lee Graves at his home in Roanoke, Virginia. This is for the Cotton to Silk Oral History Project.
Mr. Graves, what year were you born?
LG: 1915.
SS: That’s amazing, so this is your ninety-eighth birthday?
LG: Yes.
SS: You look great.
LG: Thank you.
SS: Where were you born?
LG: Arlington, West Virginia.
SS: Tell me something about your childhood years.
LG: I was born in the coalfield. We called it the Arlington Coal Company. I went to school there. I just grew there, and finally decided to leave there.
SS: Did your father work in the coal mines?
LG: Yeah, he was killed in the coal mines.
SS: He was killed there?
LG: Yeah. My father was killed in the coal mines.
SS: When you were young?
LG: Yeah. So my mother had asthma and she had to leave the coalfield. We had relatives here and so she came and joined with other people down here, so I came with my mother.
SS: Did you have brothers and sisters?
LG: Yes, I did, two brothers and five sisters.
SS: Oh, a large family. So you came to Roanoke?
LG: Yeah, but they didn’t come, just my mother and I, and a couple of sisters.
SS: You came when you were seven, did you say?
LG: No. Let’s see, I was about twenty-one.
SS: Oh, okay. So your mother, you, and a couple of sisters came to Roanoke then?
LG: Yeah.
SS: What happened then?
LG: Well, I did some odd jobs and finally somebody was telling me about the railroad. So I went down and they hired me as a dishwasher. So as a dishwasher, you move up to chef cook, and I stayed on the dining car until they needed cooks on the business car, that is the executive cars. Then I got a job, they gave me a job with the executive part of it. That’s where I stayed until I retired.
SS: When you came to Roanoke, it was during the Depression?
LG: Yeah, sometime around that.
SS: Did you live with family members?
LG: Yes, my mother rented the house and we lived there.
SS: What part of Roanoke was that?
LG: That was northwest.
SS: In this area?
LG: Yeah, in this area.
SS: When you started working for the railroad, it was during World War II?
LG: Yeah, World War II. I had been accepted in the army, but after the jobs, they called that essential job on the dining car, hauling troops, and you could get deferment. So I got two deferments rather than go into service.
SS: To serve on the troop trains?
LG: Yeah, I did. I did serve on the troop train, but I was doing troop work before I went on to the executive part of the company. I worked for about four presidents on their business cars.
SS: I want to hear about that, but tell me first about your first work on the troop trains. What did you do?
LG: I was a cook.
SS: By that time, you were moved up to cook?
LG: Yeah, I was a cook. Yeah, I started as a dishwasher. I was in deferment and I decided not to go straight in the service. I got a job in the dining car. I started off washing dishes and other things like that.
SS: And slowly learned to cook?
LG: Right.
SS: What kinds of things would you cook? What would the meals be?
LG: For breakfast, ham and eggs and sausage, that type of stuff. Lunch would be a light meal, sandwich or salad, or something like that. Dinner would always be a heavy meal. After leaving the dining car, I worked in a couple of restaurants. Then after, I went to the railroad again.
SS: Right, you took some time out?
LG: Yeah, and I went back on my dining car, cooking on the dining car. I started as a dishwasher. [Laughter] I ended up a chef, from dishwasher to chef.
SS: That’s impressive.
LG: Yeah, and first was the dining car, and then they gave me this job working for the president, which the first one was Racehorse Smith, they called him.
SS: Was your first president?
LG: He was the first one.
SS: What was that like?
LG: It was good. I worked for seven [presidents] and all of them were really fine to work for. Got to do a lot of traveling, see a lot of things, games.
SS: Baseball games?
LG: Baseball games, yeah, and even football.
SS: You would be cooking for them when they went to go to a game and you got to go too?
LG: Yeah, I got to go. Not all of them, but some of them. It was a good group to work for, a really good group. I got to see a lot of things and go a lot of places I know I’d have never gone, me and my cooking.
SS: Mr. Saunders was the next president you worked for after Smith?
LG: Saunders, yeah, Mr. Saunders after Mr. Smith.
SS: He was president for a while?
LG: Yes, he was.
SS: Tell me about that.
LG: All of them were fine men. He was a little different from the rest. As far as food, he wanted the best you could do, he wanted you to cook.
SS: Well, that’s good.
LG: Yes, it was. It was good.
SS: Mr. Saunders liked the best of everything?
LG: Oh, yeah. Yeah, he was very classy. I cooked the same thing for all of them, but Mr. Saunders did have a little more taste.
SS: What kind of things would you cook?
LG: For breakfast, ham and eggs and bacon and eggs, and they would usually eat just an average breakfast. They liked it. I mean they really wanted it to taste good and whatnot, they weren’t hard to work for anyway. I used the books. I got me a stack of books. My father was a good cook. That’s why I got a lot of him; I used to watch him cook. That’s before I came here. That was in the coalfield, and he was killed in the coal mine.
SS: But he cooked too, he cooked at home?
LG: Oh, yeah, beautiful. He would have the people who owned the coal mines that lived in Lynchburg, and they would have their meetings out on the coal camp, which was a little hotel there. He would make arrangements for them to eat and sleep and you wouldn’t think it, but they would come to our house and eat. My father would bring them in and have all this fancy stuff for them.
There was a little hotel, and they’d make arrangements for them to sleep, but they would eat at my house because my father was a very good cook and they wouldn’t even allow us in the dining room. We couldn’t come in the dining room. [Laughter]
SS: No children allowed.
LG: Right.
SS: Do you remember some of the things that he cooked?
LG: Yes, he was good on this breakfast hash and bacon and eggs and ham and just about the average breakfast. He’d like to have little fancy things that were different, and he was good even at making cakes, pies, and could cook beef tenderloin. They had the best of food to eat. We had places even then that we could make special for the dining car and we went to those same, the commissary’s downtown there, where we’d eat in the dining car. You’ve been on the dining car there?
SS: Yes.
LG: Yeah, okay. It was downtown there. We would have some very distinguished guests sometimes. I can’t pull them out now, but we would have very distinguished guests.
SS: Mr. Saunders was the president just before the Civil Rights Act was passed.
LG: Yeah, that was at about that time.
SS: Can you remember how that affected your job, if it did?
LG: It didn’t. Really, it helped, you know, helped me with quite a bit. Seeing them working and being right in here. Some of them worked sometime, but not much. Mr. Saunders, I think he worked; he cared for good food and whatnot, which was good. I had cookbooks, about three books, and I would go into them and pull out stuff and they’d leave it up to you. I can’t remember them now, but very distinguished people, some of them around here, and some of them out of town. I liked the dining car.
SS: How many cooks did you have underneath you?
LG: You’re by yourself on the business car.
SS: On the business car, it’s just you?
LG: Yeah, just you, and a waiter.
SS: How many people would you be cooking for?
LG: There probably never had been more than maybe about fifteen, something like that. Not a big number, around about fifteen. That was a good job also because I liked the dining car.
SS: What did you like about it?
LG: Working for the executives? I just liked the dining car because you were with about seven, eight, or more guys, you know, like it goes, but on the business car you’re in there by yourself. You have a waiter and a cook, and I would be the cook.
SS: Was the waiter African American also?
LG: Yes. Most of them was, all of them I find, you know by traveling, I guess it did give the nationalities a chance of them getting on the dining car, on a train car, like a waiter on the train, but it gave them better chance too. I’ve seen a lot, you know, during integration.
SS: Tell me about that.
LG: [Laughter] Like Birmingham, Alabama.
SS: Yeah, what was that like?
LG: It wasn’t too cool for us.
SS: During the Jim Crow time?
LG: That’s right. Well, don’t judge all of the people alike. I don’t care if there’s prejudice; don’t judge all of them alike. I found it out because I was in Birmingham and just went around looking, and there was a dress shop there. I looked in the window and I saw a dress that I would just love for my mother to have. I went in the store. I didn’t know whether to go in there or not, but I went in and asked. I told him, the man who owned the store, and I see the dress I’d like for my mother, but I didn’t have no money. And he said, “Come over here and tell me.” I told him, and he let me have the dress. He let me have the dress.
SS: Did you pay him gradually?
LG: No, just when I went back the next trip, I paid him all of it. The dress wasn’t over twenty-five dollars or something like that. It just seems one group would go down there and something would happen to them, like a kid with a ukulele, and he was going in and out of town, singing. The cops would get him, busted the instrument and told him to get to the quarters.
SS: What’s that?
LG: That’s where we lived.
SS: African American quarters?
LG: We called them quarters, yeah. We had a private home that we lived in. One incident I was in where the cops kind of set you down, you know. But then next time you do the same thing, and the people were just like it would be here. It was just like it’d be here. I really met some wonderful white people down there. You could see the change. You could really see the change. Like some of the guys were having this singing and dance, and the next thing they come in and tell them, “No,” and then tore it up, they came busting it down.
SS: Now the dress store owner that you were telling me about, was he white?
LG: Yeah, he was white.
SS: So you could tell a difference, Roanoke is considered a southern city, but Birmingham was a lot different?
LG: Yes, it was, but you’d be surprised how fast this turned.
SS: After integration?
LG: Yeah, after integration started. We’d get done a little earlier and we didn’t have anywhere to eat. There was a restaurant right near where the quarters where we stayed, they would feed us in the kitchen. Maybe a week or two after that, you could sit out there. It was rough, and like I said, it was more for the people who were staying there, who lived there.
SS: It was rougher for the people who lived there?
LG: Yeah, it was rougher. Of course, we had some things that happened.
SS: You did, like what?
LG: [Laughter] Well, like I was the one that had the ukulele. [Laughter] I was the one that had the ukulele, and we were making a little noise. And next thing you know, it was just hard to judge one from another because all those people weren’t as prejudiced as people say it was during that time, not all of them, because there were nice places. Then you could see it. I could see it, or at least I felt like I see it.
You go even to some of the restaurants, you’d make a mistake and you go in there, and they didn’t bother you. They didn’t bother you. It was a little rough, but you could see the change coming on. Really, you could see the change coming. Just like I said, about the man that let me have the dress for Mama, you know, you could see it. Some of the people that worked around the station there, I thought that they were nice.
Sometimes being in Birmingham they were very nice, and some of them just wouldn’t be bothered with you. I always just said, “Okay, that’s the way you feel.” I made friends even down there. Yes, sir, made friends. It was a little bitter sometimes, but the best thing I found for myself was stick to my business and do my job, what I was supposed to do, and don’t go no farther. [Laughter] Because I had friends, I made friends with them. They are like anybody else. They seemed like anybody else. We in Roanoke were buying houses.
SS: You were buying houses?
LG: Yeah, but down in Birmingham, those black people had beautiful homes. They had beautiful houses. It got to be the way, they begin to call each other by your name or something like that if they knew who you was and whatnot. I could see it, and I guess anybody could see a change coming without having a civil war. You could see it. And those people had better looking homes than my home. I mean they were living good. They had to tend to their own, you know, and I think they were just as successful in life in whatever they were doing down there, and probably it helped them. I don’t say it did, because my people always taught us just take care of your business. Just take care of your business and do what you got to do. Yes, sir.
SS: Were you on trips that went up to Ohio and up North?
LG: Yeah.
SS: Was there a big difference between here and there in terms of the racial [situation]?
LG: It’s really hard to tell. Truthfully, I just couldn’t really come out and say, but some places like Norfolk or some places we had to go down there, for some reason I could see a change coming. I mean about the dress for my mother. Finally, the fellows that were working around the train and whatnot, you begin to talk to them just like you would anyone else.
They’d talk to you. I think it is in the head. It’d get in their head that they were better than we were, or something like that. I told one friend of mine, he’s white, I said, “If you any better than I am, you’ll be living forever.” [Laughter] That rocked him. Yes, sir. Really, I liked it down there because, and the blacks sure were living better, had had houses and things like that down there, raising their children. I mean I just liked it. I still like it. I haven’t been there in quite a while, but I still like to go down there.
SS: That was when you were on the dining car, right?
LG: Yeah.
SS: Then you left the dining car?
LG: Yeah, then we were on the business car.
SS: Were you promoted? Why did you move from dining cars to business car?
LG: [Laughter] Well, I was cooking for the president.
SS: Yeah, so you had a better job?
LG: Yeah, a better job.
SS: So you applied for it?
LG: No, they selected me. I worked for four presidents and I enjoyed working for them, listening to them and other people because we had some tough presidents and we had some good ones.
SS: You worked for some tough ones?
LG: One. [Laughter]
SS: Do you want to tell me any stories about that?
LG: The man was just doing his job. If something wasn’t right, he’d tell you. But some of them had different ways of telling you than others. I didn’t have too much trouble, because I started working for superintendents, and I ended up working for these presidents, because my father used to cook and I had a sister who was a very good cook. Mama could cook too, but not like they could. I take an interest in it. I got the job on the dining car, I washed dishes. I washed dishes for about two or three months.
I liked that job because that was the only thing you had to do was get to wash those dishes. Then you go from dishwasher to third cook, then making chef. I got interested in business cars. I got ready because I found out they was really nice and got to go to these football games and everything, like Columbus, Ohio, you know, Ohio State, and even some shows. Sometimes they would carry you. Even one carried me with his wife, really.
SS: You went to like a Broadway show?
LG: No, went to baseball games. It’s something else. These fellows were very decent. The stewards they used to have on the dining car, in charge of the dining car, they were very nice to work for, I mean to be with.
SS: You didn’t have any problems with the stewards?
LG: Never. The stewards, they had a little trouble over there. [Laughter] There was a group of stewards, man they were tough.
SS: They were?
LG: Yeah, they were tough. They started bringing guns. The stewards started bringing guns. They finally got rid of them. They started bringing guns, and then the black guys, waiters, they carried their guns. [Laughter] I think these guys were a little prejudiced. Yeah, I think they a little prejudiced. They come around on the car, you know, the guys had to change clothes and things like that, so they would pull their pistol out and put them on the table or something like that. Then the waiters started carrying their guns.
SS: Did the chefs carry guns too?
LG: No, it was mostly the waiters.
SS: I see. To defend themselves from the steward?
LG: From the stewards. Yes. I don’t think that lasted long. It’s just like that because you can’t judge anybody. No, you can’t really, you can’t. Yes, sir. Those were good old days.
SS: When did you buy the house?
LG: [Laughter] We had another house on Loudon Avenue. We had one on Fairfax. First house we bought was on Fairfax Avenue. It was farther over. It was a nice house. It was a wood house. It wasn’t no brick or nothing like that, but nevertheless, where I come from in West Virginia they looked outdoors and seen what the hell of a time it was. At least it was better than nothing. Then I bought a house on Loudon Avenue and it was brick. Finally, this house came available and we decided if we could get this house, we would try to get it, so we got it. This house has a three‑car garage.
SS: It’s nice.
LG: Thank you. And [it has] a three‑car garage, but I wasn’t thinking about the highway. To me, it wasn’t bad in a way because I’ve been used to that down in West Virginia and whatnot, it really didn’t affect me, I didn’t think, there’s just only too much dust can accumulate, and right now we get a lot of dust. Yeah, we get a lot of dust. Houses were cheap.
SS: Back then?
LG: Yeah. I forget what we paid. Are you a Roanoker?
SS: No, I’m recently here, recently new.
LG: Where you from?
SS: Texas.
LG: Good old Texas, I’ve been to Texas.
SS: Got to travel a lot on the train?
LG: Oh, I did. I worked for presidents. I got to go to a lot of things, sometimes they would let you go with them. I’m not saying they did all the time, but I have gone to games with them. But they were nice. I’d say it was nice. I found out this is work and do your work and do the best you can, and pray.
SS: How many children did you have?
LG: Four girls and one boy. The girls all of them finished college.
SS: They did?
LG: Yeah. My son, I carried him up to Bluefield State College and he didn’t go back. But the girls, that’s all they can see was college. So they all of them got their degree.
SS: That’s impressive.
LG: All of them’s teachers.
SS: They’re all teachers? What did your son do?
LG: Got a job at the railroad company. [Laughter]
SS: What did he do there, or does he do?
LG: Some kind of labor down at the shops. Yeah. It’s there. Railroad life is kind of rough sometimes then, because it has a lot of things going on. Are you connected to railroads in your family?
SS: No, I’m a historian.
LG: Oh, you’re historian, that’s good. There ain’t nothing like a good historian, very good. You’ve got a good mind on you.
SS: So you said the railroad was kind of a rough place?
LG: Yes, at one time.
SS: At one time, but not now?
LG: No, not now. Well, see like the passenger service. You don’t have that now. I think it’d be all right anyway. And it was just like the same thing about Birmingham, and this gentleman was nice enough to sell me a dress for my mother. I almost think of a person as an individual, really, because I think that’s why we make the mistake about judging somebody else, like somebody else. Yes, sir. Because I know I did things I’m not supposed to do. I can get out of it because I tell the truth, and take the punishment.
SS: Like what?
LG: And take the punishment. Yes. I just like Birmingham. In fact, I like the South because all those people weren’t bad, but I say, what you do is get out of it, to run out of it. I didn’t give you nothing, did I?
SS: Yeah, yes, you did. Anything else you want to share?
LG: Let’s see.
SS: We talked about you working with Smith, Saunders. We didn’t really talk about Pevler and Fishwick.
LG: Yeah, Fishwick. Mr. Saunders. Smith. You got Smith.
SS: Yeah, we talked some about him. But Fishwick we didn’t talk about much, and Pevler.
LG: Yeah, he was a good president also, Mr. Fishwick. Most those fellows were nice. I found out you got a job to do, you try to do it, do it the best you can do. I mean, if you can’t handle it, let somebody else do it. As I told you, my father was killed in the coal mines.
SS: [Was it] an accident?
LG: Fell on him. And don’t you know I was crazy enough to go and get a job in one of the coal mines?
SS: You did?
LG: Yes, sir, I was crazy in thinking I got to have a job. Well, in fact, I did have to have a job because my mother, the compensation, it was very little money. She had asthma and some of our relatives from West Virginia moved down here. Well, Mother decided to visit and she decided to come back here, and that’s why we’re in Roanoke.
I’ve learned a lot. I was taught to treat people with respect, regardless of who you are. If the teacher would have called home to say, “How you did such and such a thing,” you’ll catch it, boy, so you better act right. I don’t really regret too much.
SS: Well, it sounds like you’ve had a really nice long career at the railroad.
LG: Yes, I can say that.
SS: And a good life.
LG: Yeah. I could go get some money, but I found out you just go ahead and do what you’re supposed to do and just do it the best you can. If you can’t do it, just tell them, “Man, I can’t do that.” Then I can always take advice, always, because as I told you I didn’t know much about cooking. I didn’t know how to boil [water]. [Laughter]
SS: When you were hired?
LG: Yeah, when I was hired. Yes, I washed dishes.
SS: You just slowly learned how to cook?
LG: Yeah, and bought some cookbooks and read them, because we had some of them and they were old then. They had to be the tops, something like the tops. They had the money, and when I did, I’d get the recipe, I would get it. You’ve got to eat some of my cooking. [Laughter]
SS: I’d like to.
LG: What do you like?
SS: Yeah, I like seafood and steak. What was your favorite recipe, did you have a favorite recipe or two?
LG: I like seafood. Now, I eat beans, pinto beans, I like those. You like them?
SS: Yes.
LG: Yeah, pinto beans. My wife was a good cook. But I think I really got more experience from working with the guy who was already chef or something like that, and then reading a book. Reading books, you’ve got to practice with them. You have to practice a little bit. Yes, sir. What’s your favorite place to eat in Roanoke?
SS: Alexander’s.
LG: You married?
SS: Yes.
LG: How many kids?
SS: Oh, I have a son who’s twenty-eight.
LG: Twenty‑eight? Oh, good. I know you’re glad to have him. I bet you’ve got him spoiled.
SS: Yes.
LG: Yeah, I got the one boy and three girls. The boy, he didn’t go, carried him up to Bluefield, registered him and everything, he didn’t call me, he went.
SS: Wanted to be a railroad man like his father.
LG: He wanted to get married. [Laughter] I said, “Man, go on to school and get a little more so you can take care of them.” It didn’t mean a thing. But these girls, I couldn’t get them out of the house fast enough.
SS: Well, I wish we could all be as lucky as you to have such a nice long life, ninety-eighth birthday today.
LG: I know. [Laughter] I don’t keep up with my birthdays.
SS: Is there anything else you’d like to add? I think we’ve had a good interview. I think we have enough material. Thank you.
[End of interview]
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