This is old blower and you know I was telling you about Founders day in the last podcast and well we we celebrated it here yesterday We had you know they had a regular picnic and the the school kids marched down here, you know in their parade They I told you they stopped at a couple years ago But since I've friend seen Adams has come down here Well, they started it up again and so they had their parade and their Quark I'm not hearing and song and they you know my girl was in it She she done solo down here and so it was a real good Celebration and then they had to picnic, you know and they had to barbecue and and all kinds of you know good food black eyed bees and and cabbage and turnal greens and you know different stuff like that and then they had to you know Watermelon and had some cantaloupe and and all kinds of you know pies and and cakes and I don't believe nobody went away Hungry I can tell you that I can tell you that everybody got plenty to eat, but you remember I was telling you about oh Friend seen you know she's a teacher down here, and she was she was wanting to do some research own Founders Day to find out Not only about Founders Day, but she wanted to know you know the truth about how this country was settled down here and Cosses up there's been all kinds of stories that was floating around about how it was settled and who settled it and The the story was you know that I learned when I was in school was at all There was this fellow named Walter black and he come down here and and and and bought this land up and and built the settlement and And people moved in down here, and that's how the This settlement of wellwood was you'll come to be and that was the story that I learned when I was in school And but there wasn't much else knowed about it And so Francine you know she learned how to do that research when she was up there at the university You know and she come down here And she wanted to find out you know she growed up down here and she wanted to find out about how this country was settled And so she started doing research and it started trying to read books and going to the library and and Different stuff to find out and she couldn't she said she couldn't find out nothing. She said it was like a Somebody had thought a stone wall up, you know I mean she just meant that you know she couldn't find out nothing that it seemed like it was a secret and She couldn't find no mention of Walter black down here And she said there was a Walter black up there in Osiola But there wasn't no Walter black down here, and she didn't she didn't know where that story come from Well, I told her you know I said well Francine, you know keep me posted if you Learn anything I said I'd like to know the truth which I would and You know I told you in the last podcast that She had told me some stuff and I told you it was kind of Disappointing to me. Well, I didn't really mean it was disappointing what I meant to say was that if you've learned Something all your life and then you find out that it ain't true You know you had to you had to learn it again And you know I'm getting pretty old I can't learn like I used to could and so I've got to forget Everything that I learned and to learn it over again And that's what I meant by being disappointed because I don't care how it was settled You know I want to know the truth just like everybody does well Francine you know she told me there wasn't no Walter black and and I don't heard of Walter black all my life so I didn't know what to make out of that and Francine went down to talk to Flossy butts because you know she just Wonder women in the neighborhood that Francine knows and she went down to talk to Flossy butts and of course Flossy ain't from around here She grew up somewhere north of here And she told Francine that she said I don't know you know as much about it as you do But she said you know I've been taking care of O' Emily down here And she's a good friend of mine and she said if anybody down here would know anything about it It would be Emily and she said next time I see Emily I'll talk to her about it and see what she says so Next time Flossy seen him leave you got asked in her about how this country was settled ask her did she know anything about it and Oh Emily said yes, she know quite a bit about it said she used to Talk to people down here that know how the country was settled and and she said she didn't think though that that people down here would want to know She said she thought they probably would just want to go on believing what they had believed up to this point and Flossy said why Emily I don't think that's that's true She said I think people wouldn't want to know the truth and Emily said well, you know People they don't want to give Afro-Americans no credit for doing anything and she said I Don't know if if everybody's like that enough but she said I think probably the best thing to do would just be to forget it and and Flossy said why Emily that ain't true She said the people down here. She said they got no Prejudices, she said you know You and me has always been real good friends and and she said every time they have a picnic down here or party, you know everybody's invited and we all mingle together and She said it might have used to have been that way, but she said it ain't that way no more and And so she talked to Emily talked to Francine I'm I didn't mean to say that Flossy talked to Francine and told her what Emily had said and Flossy I mean Francine said well Flossy I want to go down there with you because I want to settle her straight on that and so they went down there and talked to Emily and Francine said Emily that ain't true no more and they it used to be True down here to some extent said probably not to the same Degree that it was in other places, but she said they probably was some prejudice down here at one time another But she said if you know anything about how this country was settled We really would appreciate you letting us know cuz I said I'm working on a book and said I've got to have some help if I'm gonna Write this book and so in late You know she told her that she'd tell her what she knowed and she told her a lot about how this country was settled But she told her that she told her that there was a Walter Black and said he was from up in Osiola and And and Francine said well yeah, I saw that but said he wasn't he didn't come down here and Emily said Oh, yeah, he did she said what he done said he was a speculator and said he speculated in land and said he Told lies about the land up there in Osiola and they tried to sell it to people and and Miss Well told him stories that wasn't true about it and said he got in trouble with the law And they was going to put him in jail and what he had done is he had changed his name To Johnny Greenwood and said he had moved down here So when you saw Johnny Greenwood and you said if you look you'll see Johnny Greenwood on the road and she said that's really Walter Black is who that is and so flossy I mean Francine got to looking at the the Your documents down here in the papers and the books in the library and she found out sure enough that you Johnny Greenwood Had bought up this land down here and he'd bought it for black You know it was small because what it was had been dreamed and he bought the land of real cheap and he had Heard that the railroad was coming down here So he was buying up this land and he was gonna wait till the railroad come down here And then he was gonna sell it to all the people and make him a ton of money Well as it turned out the railroad didn't come down here.
It went to hell and I'm dead so Johnny Greenwood or Walter Black whatever you want to call him We'll see he had paid all that money for that land even though he had bought it cheap He had bought a bunch of it and now he couldn't sell it no way at all And he was he was up to his ears in debt and they was gonna put him in jail down here You know because he owed all this money and he wasn't paying it off and he owed it to the bank and the bank was gonna foreclose on him and they was gonna arrest him from misrepresenting What he had what he had bought so he had to sell the land is what it was and so There was this fella over here in Tennessee And he was a Afro-American gentleman and his name was John Baker and John Baker was looking for a place see they had all kinds of trouble over in Tennessee and and what he wanted to do was get out of there and settle somewhere away from everybody and and build up a community where everybody was Well, you know could get along with each other so he come down here and he run into old Johnny Greenwood and so Johnny Greenwood tried to sell him the land well old John Baker, you know what no fool and so he offered He made him what they call a counter offer and it wasn't nothing like what Johnny Greenwood was expecting to get but he didn't have no choice because he was about to go to jail so oh John Baker bought this land down here for a whole lot less than what Johnny Greenwood or or Walter Black who ever you want to call him? He he bought it from him for a whole lot less than what he paid for it But Walter Black didn't have no choice but to sell it to him and so that's how this country got settled down here in the first place and Emily told Francine she said now they was up There was a book that we used to read when we was in school and said y'all probably didn't have it in your schools You know that was back when my schools were separate and they'd like that no more But it was back then and she said we had this book that we'd always read and she said she thought that the preacher up there had to book and so Francine went up there and talked to the preacher and he showed her the book and so that's that's about all that I can tell you Right now our friend saying told me she said I ain't gonna tell you no more about it until I get You know through with the story and find out the whole thing because she said they some stores That's true in this some that ain't and so till I get to the bottom of it I ain't gonna say nothing else about it And she said but I will give you a copy of the book when I get when I get through writing it And so I told her that was that that really was the right thing to do I said get get all the information straight So that we all will know the truth about it and so she's doing her research now, but it's gonna take her you know Year maybe two years maybe longer than that for she can get the story, but It's a it's a really interesting which you can find out and now that now that she's told me You know I'm glad that I know the truth because I don't like to know stuff You know that ain't that ain't so and it's a shame that all that Story got started about Walter Black But see we didn't know no better and the people that told us that story didn't know no better and the community was not founded in 1881 it was started up in 1883 because that was a year that John Baker moved down here and bought up the land so anyway That's all I can tell you right now till until a flossy I'm team till Francine publishes her book and then I'm gonna read it and it was anything else that you know that I find Interested and I'm gonna do another podcast on it But I think I think it's really a fascinating story if you don't know the truth about how stuff can get Can get changed, you know and distorted because see we had it all wrong and So it is good to know the truth about it And so I'll let you know when I find out something It might be your two or three years from now, but whenever I find out some more information about it. I'll let you know