Linda Jones

Published on July 31, 2015

Photo of Robert Smith "At Christmas we would - the city of Homewood used to black tar Loveless Street and block it off and we would skate, skate, skate. Everybody get your skates, because that's what you got for Christmas."

Chapters

Growing Up in Rosedale

Linda Jones talks about her childhood experiences in the Rosedale community. She describes the many activities she and the other children in the Rosedale community took part in, including games, events, and employment.

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Rosedale Community: School and Church

Linda Jones talks about her memories of school and church in Rosedale. She explains how tightly knit Rosedale School was, how everyone went to church, and how many people (herself included) continue to attend church in Rosedale despite moving neighborhoods.

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Rosedale Community: Stores, Businesses, and Restaurants

Linda Jones describes the many business in Rosedale and their influences on the community's culture. She lists the many community activities that she and her friends took part in, including Scouts, basketball, and the Rosedale Teenage Club.

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Changes in Rosedale: Red Mountain Expressway

Linda Jones describes the 1964 construction of the Red Mountain Expressway that fractured the Rosedale infrastructure.

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May Day

Linda Jones talks about the annual May Festival celebration and the activities the school contributed to it.

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Leaving Rosedale

Linda Jones talks about her family's move from Rosedale and how others have also moved away from the neighborhood. She emphasizes that even living in distant places, they still maintain their community.

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Rosedale’s Relationship with Surrounding Communities

Linda Jones discusses Rosedale's relationship with nearby communities and failing attempts to preserve the neighborhood.

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The Future of Rosedale

Linda Jones talks about how Rosedale has lost much of what made it special, and how other neighborhoods continue to encroach upon it.

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Rosedale Memories: Entertainment

Linda Jones recounts some childhood memories, including Rosedale School's principal, Friday night dances, and skating on Loveless Street (now B.M.Montgomery Street) on Christmas.

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Rosedale Memories: Home Remedies

Linda Jones describes various home remedies her family used while growing up, and goes on to describe some of the common foods they ate.

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Rosedale Memories: Community

Linda Jones sums up by detailing the close-knit Rosedale community. She describes how no one locked their doors, all neighbors had open invitations to each other houses. She talks about how other neighborhoods knew that the people of Rosedale were reliable workers, and about how Rosedale was a self-sustaining community.

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Transcript

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: OK, so I know that with Mr. Ramsey's interview, some, we
were able to get some stories from you as well, but we wanted to have it to
where each person had their own specific story to tell and I know that you've,
have you been in Rosedale, were you born in Rosedale?

LINDA JONES: I sure was. I was born in Rosedale.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: OK and I guess the question that we always ask is when and
where were you born?

LINDA JONES: Yeah that's where I was, Rosedale, Alabama at University Hospital
and during that time, the coloreds as we were then, you know, went from colored
to negro to black to African American, but the coloreds at that time were born
in the basement of the hospital so that's where I was born, in the basement of
University Hospital.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And were your parents from Rosedale?

LINDA JONES: Mmhmm, well, mainly and mostly. They came as children, so they
weren't born in Rosedale.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: But they grew up in Rosedale.

LINDA JONES: Yes they grew up in Rosedale.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: OK so firm roots in that neighborhood.

LINDA JONES: Oh yes.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And did you have brothers or sisters?

LINDA JONES: Yes, yes, and all my brothers and sisters, I'm the oldest, but they
were born there also.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: OK so you were the big sister then.

LINDA JONES: Oh, yes. Most definitely. Yes, yes, yes.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Did that require a lot from you then?

LINDA JONES: Oh, yes. Everything I did, "Don't do that because your sisters and
brothers are watching. You know your sisters and brothers are watching. You're
setting an example." Yes, that required a lot.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So you were a role model.

LINDA JONES: Yes, most definitely. One that I didn't want to be, but I had to
be, yes. Yes, yes, yes. I didn't ask for that but I had to be.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: That's funny. And, I guess, going back to your parents, what
did they do for a living?

LINDA JONES: My father dug ditches for Alabama Power and my mother worked at
the, she didn't work all the time like, when, she had four children and when she
had a baby, she didn't work and, uh, but she worked at the Jefferson County
Nursing Home.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: OK and, so growing up in Rosedale, and this is kind of, we had
talked about it with Mr. Ramsey as well, but could you tell me what growing up
in Rosedale was like as a child?

LINDA JONES: It was fun and exciting and I've often wished that my own children
had had the same opportunity and seemed like it was a lot of children on each
street in Homewood because you only played with the children on your street when
you were small and as you got a little older you could venture over to another
street maybe and then another street as you got older but when you, growing up,
you played with the children on your street and it seemed like it was a lot of
them and it was a lot of fun and we had like organized games, you know, and in
the evening we always played hide and go seek and we called it high spy. I don't
know, don't ask me where that came from, but we called it high spy, and we
played a lot of baseball games that we made up. I didn't find out that we had
made them up until after I got grown because nobody else knew about those types
of games and, uh, it was just fun. We always had something to do. We played
hopscotch, fiddlesticks, jacks, jump rope, uh, we went in the ditch, the ditch
ran alongside of my grandmother's house and we could go out there with the
little can and catch tadpoles and as you get older, you could, um, roll the logs
out the way and get a can of bait to sell to the fishermen. You could also sell
iron to the ironmen when he came around to get scraps. You could sell cloths to
the, it wasn't called the cloth, rag man, to the rag man and you could sell, uh,
Coke bottles and soda bottles, you could return them to the store and you could
get a lot of money for one bottle. For some reason, I don't know why. I know
they were reusable but seems to me that it went up to five cents a bottle, you
know, so I found out also after I got grown and started working with children in
other parts of Birmingham, that they didn't have the same opportunity to get
money that we had. You could always have money because after you got older, uh,
all the guys could always caddy. They could caddy. They could work at the Club,
they could work at the country clubs. It was always somewhere to work and the
girls too, um, you could, uh, babysit. You could work at the country clubs, um,
you could, I worked at the drug store at High Cale Drugs as a soda clerk
and, uh, it was some, as a teenager working in the drug store where other, where
the white teenagers would come in for french fries and milkshakes, it was some,
you know, talk exchanged and banter and stuff and I was like in high school and
my freshman year in college when I was working at the drug store and the radio
personalities during that time, Country Boy Eddie, Tom York, and, uh, the
beautiful lady that used to be on there too. Oh, I can't think of her name right
now, but they would come in after their show and, uh, Country Boy Eddie would
always have something to say about my afro and he and I would just get into it.
We could really get into it, but you know, we was all just, you know, just
talking back and forth, but it was a good life growing up because it was always
something to do. It was always, uh, games on the weekend. They had organized
baseball teams that played on the ball diamond and like I say it was called the
ball diamond because you played any kind of ball on there.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Every kind of ball.

LINDA JONES: That's right. That's right. So it was the ball diamond, so everyone
met there on the weekends for games to go up to Vulcan was free then and you
could even walk in Vulcan's head, you know. And so we would go up to Vulcan and
it was free to go to the zoo then. The only charge was the ten cents you would
have to pay for the train.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Ten cents.

LINDA JONES: Ten cents and so we had the zoo and also it was a movie theater in
downtown Homewood and the colored people, well by that time maybe it was black
people, had to sit up in the balcony of the movie theater but it still was a
movie theater right there in the community, you know, so it was a self-contained
community. You didn't have to leave out of the community to have fun and go
places like it is now, you know.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Right things are more spread out.

LINDA JONES: Yes.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So there was no, it sounds like there was no sitting at home on
the sofa doing nothing.

LINDA JONES: Oh no, if you sat at home, they were going to find something for
you to do. You were shelling peas, dusting or mopping or something so you best
get with your friends and find something to do outside. That's right, you had to
weed the garden or something if you were just at home. No, there was no sitting
around and plus, why would you sit at home? There was just two TV stations,
channel six and channel thirteen. Channel ten didn't come along until later, so
why sit at home?

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: No reason.

LINDA JONES: That's right, no reason, that's right. Unless you were reading, you
know, sometimes I did that. I was an avid reader so sometimes in the evening I
would, you know, sit at home and read and that was fun to me.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Yeah, and you mentioned reading, which makes me ask about, or
makes me think about the school, Rosedale School, is that where you went as a child?

LINDA JONES: Oh yes, Rosedale School. That's where my mother graduated from also.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And that's what they called the rock school, the rock building?

LINDA JONES: Yes. Made out of the rocks in the mountains of Rosedale.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And I remember Mr. Ramsey saying that you, uh, I think you went
from elementary all the way to high school?

LINDA JONES: First grade through twelfth grade at that same school and most
times it was just once, well, half the time it was two sections because I
remember in the third grade there were a lot of children. Well we had two first
grades and we had two second grades and they thought they were going to get by
with one third grade but they had to call in a teacher and so most of the time
it was two grades. Two sections to a grade.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: OK and, uh, so did you pretty much know everyone that you had
class with?

LINDA JONES: You knew them better than you knew your siblings because there you
are sitting with them from the first grade to the twelfth grade and most of the
times if you were in that section, you were in that section for life, so did you
know them? Oh, too well.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Too well (laughs)

LINDA JONES: Yes, yes.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Could read their mind and--

LINDA JONES: You knew everything about them. We had our class reunion a few
weeks ago and it's just so funny how people, they're just older, the same
people, they're just older, you know. It was so funny.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So it was like going back in time?

LINDA JONES: It really was. It really was. We had too much fun and we went on
the train, so we were all hyped up, going on the train, we were hyped up while
we were there and on the way back on the train it was a different group. (laughs)

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Everybody sleep or knocked out?

LINDA JONES: And feeling their age, taking meds, yes. It was a different group.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: That's good y'all had fun though.

LINDA JONES: Oh we had so much fun because like I said, these people are closer
than your sisters and brothers because you were just with them nine months out
of the year, um, you know, all half the day and by the time you got home and did
your homework and at your dinner and got ready for the next day, it's time to go
to bed, so you didn't see your siblings that much, but you knew, you knew your classmates.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Right, and then I imagine you spend, would you spend time with
them during the summer too?

LINDA JONES: Yes! Yes, I thought about that. After being with them all the time,
then in the summer time we would seek each other out, you know, as we got older,
old enough to walk from street to street. We would go and visit each other at
their houses, so, and we went to church together. There were only three
churches, so.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Was that, which churches were those?

LINDA JONES: Well it was also three smaller churches but the three major
churches were Friendship Baptist, Union Baptist, and Bethel AME and then
there was three smaller churches, uh, and they were Church of God and Christ,
what was the one, oh the other two are gone, but they were something like Church
of God and Christ but not Church of God and Christ.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Ok, and did, growing up, did you go to one particular,
particular church?

LINDA JONES: From birth to now I still go there.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Stick with one (laughs). Is that Bethel AME or--?

LINDA JONES: Friendship.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Friendship, that's right, OK.

LINDA JONES: Yes. Friendship and Union used to be the same church and then it
had, back in the, I know the, back in the nineteen, about 1925 or '26 they had a
split and so that's how we got two Baptist churches. Originally it was one
Baptist church, one Methodist church. That's' how we had the two Baptist churches.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: OK and growing up in the church, I mean, I guess you're seeing
the same people--

LINDA JONES: Same people

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: --that you'd see in school or in the neighborhood.

LINDA JONES: Yes, yes, same people. Mmhmm. That's right.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So, what was going to church there like? I mean, has it changed
much from when you were growing up?

LINDA JONES: Not much, but it has changed because the original people of
Rosedale are gone and we have a bunch of new people who've moved into the
neighborhood and people like myself, who moved out of the neighborhood, we just
come back to church there, so a lot of people come back to church there, but it
doesn't necessarily have the cohesiveness that it did, you know, when I was a
child, but it's pretty much the same, but different in that it's not as many
people and the church is not wide open twenty-four/seven.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So growing up, going to church were y'all there every time the
doors were open or...?

LINDA JONES: Well yes. We had a lot of activities at church and we had, you
know, regular church, Vacation Bible School, Baptist Training Union, so it was
always something going on, choir rehearsal, usher board meetings, so yes, it was
a lot of church going on.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So the churches play a big role.

LINDA JONES: Yes, a big role.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And then talking about places like the school and the church, I
imagine that things like the stores, the businesses, the restaurants, were they
a big, uh, fixture as well?

LINDA JONES: Yes, yes, yes. We had, we knew exactly what each store sold and
what you went to each store for and we had, uh, Gentry's Store and it was on
Loveless Street and we had, uh, Charlie and Henry's Store, those were two
brothers, but we just called it Charlie's Store, but both of them worked in
there and owned the store and then we had, Jessie was their sister and their
other brother was E.P. so we had E.P.'s store.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: E.P. Montgomery?

LINDA JONES: Yes, all these are Montgomerys and then we had, uh, the Lee Store
and so, yes, we had a number of stores in the neighborhood and some of them were
situated in what we call up on the road, but that was really our downtown,
because that was where Reynolds' Cleaners, Lee Store, Perkins Barber Shop, and
the Grill, which was like a restaurant, then at night it was a juke joint and
then we had, uh, Fess Place and the pool hall was under Fess Place, then
upstairs it was like a joint with a rock hall in it for the young people, not
teenagers, but not old enough to hang with the grill people, so that was their
place, so it was always something for everybody to do. A lot of dancing going on
all the time, a lot of music going on and up at the Grill, they just played the
blues as loud as they wanted to.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Ah man, that sounds like a dream. That sounds so cool.

LINDA JONES: You could just pass by there and hear everybody my age probably
knew about the blues whether they wanted to or not because you could hear it all
the time and then we had the community center for the young teenagers and it
was, the community center had loads and loads of activities. We had, uh, Brownie
Scouts, Girl Scouts, we had, the Boy Scouts, they had the organized baseball
team, the basketball teams, girls and boys. I played basketball and, Miss Be
Be was over the girls' basketball team and then they had, Mr. Samford who was
over the center at that time. He had a club called the Rosedale Teenage Club
and, we thought it was so good to be in the Rosedale Teenage Club. You went to
meeting every, I think it was Monday night, you paid your quarter, and you got a
long sleeve T-shirt, I still have mine, and we went on a train trip every year
and we just went from Birmingham to like Tennessee somewhere, real short ride,
but it seemed long back then and you got off and you played in this park and you
got back on the train and you ate your lunch and came home and then he would
have music appreciation where all of us in this room, all the teenagers and we'd
listen to jazz and we had to pick out the instruments and tell who the artist
was. I'm trying to figure out myself, what was the Teenage Club, that's why I'm
saying (laughs).

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Trying to figure out what this is. (laughs)

LINDA JONES: Right, right and we had a dance on Friday nights from seven, I
think the dance was from seven to nine. It might have been from eight to ten but
it was somewhere in that range and you paid a quarter to go in and, um, we just
had a very good time. The music was good and it was just a lot of fun.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Fun, so now when you listen to music, do you think to yourself
"I got to figure out who's playing what?"

LINDA JONES: Yeah, what instrument they're playing with. Yeah sometimes I do, yes.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: You had mentioned sports that you had played basketball?

LINDA JONES: Yes I played basketball, yes.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Is that right, was that, I can't remember, was that through the
school or...?

LINDA JONES: No, this was through, now they had an organized basketball team
through the school when my mom played basketball and she played basketball for
the high school, at the school, and Ms. Laban, I think, was over the basketball
team then, but by the time I got there the only one we had was in the community,
so, it was not one at the school, but you know we had other activities at the
school, um, our PE teacher, Ms. Baylor, she would get used equipment from the
white high schools and she would take some chalk and go outside and draw us a
tennis court on the grounds by the parking, just so we would know what tennis
was and he fundamental steps to playing tennis, but we didn't have a, we didn't
get a tennis court until later, they got one down at the center, later, after I
had left.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And I remember you saying that playing basketball in the
community center--

LINDA JONES: The Cracker Box.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: --the Cracker Box, was a little close.

LINDA JONES: Yes, it was. The other schools named it that actually because we
were so much smaller. Our gym was so small, so much smaller than the other gyms,
and we did everything in the Cracker Box. Yes they had us, we had ping pong
tables in there, they had a shuffle board thing drawn on the floor in there, so
we made use of the Cracker Box and had lots of fun in there and I kept the clock
for the school basketball team and so, yeah, it was fun.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And did you ever play any sports at the ball diamond?

LINDA JONES: No, but I would go. I would go to some of the games at the ball
diamond and because whether you liked sports or not, it was just a big gathering
hub and someone was out there cooking hotdogs and, uh, frying fish and selling
sodas and whoever did it, that's who got the money, I mean, it was not, you
know, like an organized thing or anything.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So is it mainly a source of entertainment and something to do?

LINDA JONES: It was, it was. It was a great source of entertainment and when it
was really, really sad, when the school no longer had a football team and that
great band. They had a wonderful, spectacular band. I mean, it was just
outstanding and the majorettes were second to none. I mean, they were so
entertaining and the cheerleaders do everything. They were just so organized, so
entertaining, the uniforms were beautiful. It was just wonderful and then it
just all disappeared.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Just in...

LINDA JONES: After the road went through the football field. They said they had
to run the road right there at the end of the freeway. That's where the ball
diamond was.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Now is that Eighteenth Street, the Red Mountain Expressway?

LINDA JONES: Yes, yes. Exactly.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: OK yeah, because I do remember, well even looking on the map
today you can see where Twenty-fifth Court South is split down the middle where
it would go, but then going this way is the highway.

LINDA JONES: That's right and all those places and service stations over there.
All those used to be houses, you know. There used to be a hotel right up in Homewood.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And about, about when do you think that was that the road came
through? Do you remember?

LINDA JONES: It was in about 1964. Around that time. Around '64.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: OK and so do you think that was the major turning point, as far
as changes in the community?

LINDA JONES: Yes, I do. I feel that way because it was such sadness and so much
was taken away with just running that road through it because it took away the
Sunday gatherings at the ball park, it took away the school games because that's
where the school games were played, and therefore we had no more, no need for a
band or majorettes, so it took a chunk, a large component out of the community
and the school, it did, and, well even before then, they had taken the downtown,
you know, they had, they widened Eighteenth Street, that's what they said they
needed to do and that took away all of that, all of that.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Was it the houses and businesses?

LINDA JONES: Yes, along Eighteenth Street, it was just businesses back then, the
downtown. That's what it took. Just wiped it out.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And then, I guess that gradually, over time, things started to
move in closer and closer to...?

LINDA JONES: Well, yes, a lot of businesses where houses used to be and then we
had like a wonderful swimming pool where everybody, any age, no matter what, you
could come and swim and then they said "The swimming pool has a crack in it. We
got to cover it up but we're going to fix it and it'll be back open next year."
That was in, around in 1969.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So nearly fifty years.

LINDA JONES: Yes, nearly fifty years ago and it's still covered up with gravel.
As a matter of fact, they put a couple of playground pieces on the swimming
pool, so.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So it's a park now, I guess?

LINDA JONES: Yes, it's still a park of such, but yeah, sort of. It was always a
park before the swimming pool was there because it was Spring Park and that's
where the guys would go and swim anyway and gather up and talk and, you know, it
was a cool shady place to gather.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: I think I'd heard that it used to come from a spring or a creek.

LINDA JONES: Yes, there was a spring that would come through there. I think that
spring is still there. I'm sure it doesn't bubble up as much as it used to be,
because the ditch, when I pass by the ditch that it leads into, it's always dry,
so I'm sure, I don't know why, but I'm sure it's pretty much dry.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: I remember, uh, Mr. Ramsey talking some about May Day as well.

LINDA JONES: Oh, the May Festival.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: The May Festival.

LINDA JONES: Yes, we would have May Day in May and that was just a big thing for
the school and for the community. No classes that day, we were supposed to have
classes in the morning, but no, we were too busy practicing our routines and
everybody wanted to outdo the next class and it was just a great and wonderful
thing. The band, our band played so loud, we could hear them all over Rosedale
and it was just wonderful. Everybody would bring food and coolers and it was
just a really festive time.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So I mean that was something that everybody participated in.

LINDA JONES: Yes and we had a big May pole and the girls, when you got to the
sixth grade, you could plait the May pole and you had to wear whatever string
you were carrying, your dress, you had to get a long dress made out of that
color. If you were plaiting it with pink, your mama had to get you a pink long
dress for her to plait the May pole, so that was real pretty.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Sounds like fun.

LINDA JONES: It was, it was.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So you had mentioned earlier that you had moved from Rosedale?

LINDA JONES: Yes, I live over in College Hills, over near Birmingham Southern College.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: When, when did you move?

LINDA JONES: I know the lady's name from channel six, Pat Gray.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Pat Gray, OK, it came to you.

LINDA JONES: Yes, it came to me.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: That happens so many times. I'll think of something and can't
remember it until later.

LINDA JONES: That was good though, fifty years later (laughs).

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Still got it.

LINDA JONES: Yeah, sometimes (laughs).

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So when did you move from Rosedale to College Hills?

LINDA JONES: After I finished high school, we moved. They had been saving up
money for a house, seemed like all my life, but I'm the oldest of my siblings by
eight years, so when I left, when I finished high school, everybody moved. We moved.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And you still have the tie to...

LINDA JONES: Oh yes, I was over there all the time because I have relatives over
there, so I was over there every week and especially every weekend, so yes.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: That's good because, I mean, like Mr. Ramsey was saying, that
you have people that moved off to, like him, to California or Detroit and they still--

LINDA JONES: Come home.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: --come home, yeah.

LINDA JONES: They do. Yeah a lot of people moved to California. A lot of people
moved to Detroit and Cleveland and a few moved other places, but it's like
groups of them that went to California and Detroit and Cleveland.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: It's something, I think it's something special that they come
back and keep the connection.

LINDA JONES: We had like, until about twenty years ago or less, we had the
Rosedale Picnic Club and they would have a bus or two that would leave Rosedale
going to Cleveland, Detroit, and some people lived in Chicago and we would fly
to California, but each one of those places had their own Rosedale Club and they
were the hosts for that summer weekend and they would have like a big, well
everybody had the same thing. On Friday night you had a banquet, on Saturday
night you had this big party, and on Sunday you had the picnic and everybody
would leave the Sunday or Monday going back home, usually Sunday night after the
picnic and they did that for years and then finally with so many original
residents leaving, that just fizzled out. But they still come back to Rosedale,
but we don't go to the other places. They still come back to the Rosedale Picnic
every two years.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And I remember you saying that each city wanted to outdo the
other one.

LINDA JONES: Oh yes, oh yes.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So there was a competition.

LINDA JONES: It was a competition, oh yes. One year Chicago showed out so bad.
Oh, wow! They had fire dancers as a sideshow. Oh, it was ridiculous, yes. It was wonderful.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: That's funny, everyone wanted to one-up the other one.

LINDA JONES: Oh yes, oh yes. Yes, yes, yes. Everybody would wear, you know,
formals, and tuxedos and dress in their best for the dance, you know, and it was
just really, really nice. Festive.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: With Rosedale being, because I know that Rosedale and, was it
Rosedale and Edgewood that had merged to become Homewood or is that right?

LINDA JONES: It was another place too.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Was it Oak, Oak Grove?

LINDA JONES: Well, no...

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Or Oak Hill?

LINDA JONES: Oak Grove was still there. It was another place that they don't use
that name anymore. I'm sure if you think of Ms. Tubb's interview, I'm sure she
probably called the name of it.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Yeah, I'll have to look in there. I guess sort of going off of
that, how would you describe Rosedale's relationship with the surrounding
communities, surrounding neighborhoods?

LINDA JONES: I think it's about the same as it always was. We were smack dab
right in the middle of Homewood, but Homewood was separate, you know, Homewood
was Homewood and Rosedale was Rosedale. We didn't even try to merge. Didn't even
think about merging, you know, so it was just, we were there together, but not
together, you know, yeah.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Yeah, together geographically I guess.

LINDA JONES: Yes, but it was no problems or anything like that.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Right, yeah. So do you feel like Rosedale's relationship with
Homewood today is the same or different?

LINDA JONES: Well maybe a little more resentful today because as we look back
over all that's been taken and the, just how Rosedale's just practically gone
and there's a lot of talk about that and a lot of meetings that the community
and other interested people have to go to to try to save Rosedale and it still
doesn't do any good, you know, so it's different in that way.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: I imagine, I mean, I imagine it has to be frustrating too,
because I'd seen on the Homewood Star, the news, that they have the meetings in
there and said that there is that feeling of "OK, well--"

LINDA JONES: Hopelessness.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: That something gets put off and put off and put off. I mean I
would be frustrated too.

LINDA JONES: Yes, so it's different in that way. They're looked upon as just
taking everything, you know, and not and people, that's why people moved out,
because these were people who were upwardly mobile, they kept their yards cut
and when it wasn't any grass, they kept it swept. If it wasn't any paint, they
would whitewash the house and that neighborhood was cute and nice, but then they
start losing hope, because they saw what was going on, so people started looking
out for better neighborhoods to go to, so that's what happened. Families left
and moved to a better neighborhood.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And talking about the houses, some of them, I know have got to
be almost one hundred years old.

LINDA JONES: Plus.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: More than that.

LINDA JONES: That's right.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And still standing.

LINDA JONES: That's right. Bethel Church is 119 years old and Union is older
than Bethel, so they're one hundred and twenty something, I don't know exactly what.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: I had read about some of the shotgun houses.

LINDA JONES: Oh yeah, we had a lot of that. A lot of shotgun houses, you know.
They had like, well a shotgun house could have three rooms or four rooms, but
when I was in college I met a friend and they lived in a shotgun house that had
five rooms.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Really?

LINDA JONES: She said "If you can come in the front door and look out the back,
that's a shotgun house." I said "I didn't realize they could have more than
three rooms."

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: So they got creative with it.

LINDA JONES: They just went, every time, she said "Every time my dad had a
child, three children, he'd just add on another room." It was just easier to
make the room look exactly like the other rooms.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Yeah have some consistency, I guess, in the architecture.

LINDA JONES: That's right.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Another question would be, and I've asked this in the other
interviews, is what do you see going forward for Rosedale?

LINDA JONES: Well, it's obvious that Homewood wants Rosedale. That's obvious and
they're taking it by imminent domain and they're taking it just a little at a
time whenever they get ready. Just two weeks ago or three weeks ago, they took
E.P.'s store and so they took E.P.'s store and they took the little apartments
that were behind E.P.'s store and that's a landmark.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Been there probably for how many decades, I can't imagine.

LINDA JONES: I know, yes, so it'll be probably gone in, completely gone in less
than twenty years.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Do, related to that question, it's similar but somewhat
different, is what would be your hopes or your wish going into the future
regarding Rosedale?

LINDA JONES: Well I hope that the people can maintain some type of cohesiveness
through the churches, through the Rosedale picnics, and that's the way we're
doing it now, so I hope we keep it up. I hope we'll always remember Rosedale and
remember each other.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And then another question, this is one, it may be kind of open,
might be a broad question, but are there any notable or memorable or funny
stories that just come straight into your mind about growing up there or church
or school or things at the ball diamond?

LINDA JONES: Well plenty of funny stories that might have seemed just ordinary
back then. One is that our principal, he just stood in the hall with both his
hands behind his back and he would say "Yep, yep." (laughs) I don't know why he
did that but that's all he did and he very seldom made an announcement. Very
seldom. And if there was any discipline it was made by who we called the
assistant principal, but he was really the coach, you know, but, you know, they
had, teachers all had a dual role, you know. The girls' advisor was the twelfth
grade teacher, the counselor was the choir teacher, you know. They had dual
roles and he really didn't do anything. He didn't. He didn't do a thing. He was
very intelligent, though. He had written a book and, um, he had written a book
and he, uh, Loveless Street is named Montgomery Street now and his sister Gentry
stayed with him and her store was like, it came out from the bottom of his house
and, um, so he was, it was obvious that he was intelligent, but he, even if you
tried to make a conversation with him, he would only say about three or four
words, so I always thought that was funny for a principal. Principal of the
school, you know, and we had funny people all over the neighborhood, but on
Friday nights in Rosedale that's when everything got popping. That's when the
young people went up to Fess Place. The people who shot pool went to the pool
hall. The old people went to the grill. The teenagers went up to the center and
some people, they just got dressed, everybody got dressed on Friday nights, on
Friday evening, and some people, they just got dressed and just walked the
streets and if anybody was going to pick at anybody or argue with anybody or
fight anybody it was on Friday night. It was on Friday night. It's, you know, by
Sunday everything had calmed all the way back down, so, yep. So it was a very
interesting community. You could get entertained just by sitting on your front porch.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And watching what went on.

LINDA JONES: Watching the different characters pass by. That's right.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Ms. Tubb, she had said something about these two men who, at
the ball diamond, they would come and they would dress in women's clothes.

LINDA JONES: Oh, just for entertainment.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: She said that's what she said they weren't, you know, like
alternative lifestyle or nothing, she said, you know, they had families or
whatever, but they, she said they would come and dress in women's clothes and
she said they could not, you know, stand for laughing so hard. Said they thought
that was the funniest--

LINDA JONES: I'm telling you, yes, it was a funny community. Yes, goodness.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Good place to grow up.

LINDA JONES: Oh yes, I miss it too. I ride through there and I say "Oh, it's
gone." It's leaving rapidly. At Christmas we would, the city of Homewood used to
black tar Loveless Street and block it off and we would skate, skate, skate.
Everybody get your skates, because that's what you got for Christmas. Everybody
got some skates for Christmas. I think they cost five dollars, come with skate key.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Wow five dollars.

LINDA JONES: You used the skate key to fix them, tighten them up, everything,
and Union Hardware, that was the name of the skates and you got those for
Christmas and you come up on Loveless Street and it was some skating going on.
Yes, yes, yes. It was some skating going on, but it was a group older than I was
and they liked to skate and they would skate like from Vulcan all the way up to
the top of Homewood and it was a big group of them and you could just hear them
skating and they would just, all of them, girls and boys, dressed in blue jeans
and oh, they would have their cuffs rolled up real high and it was something to see.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: I bet because that's, I mean, that's quite a distance.

LINDA JONES: Yeah, I know!

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Skating from Vulcan.

LINDA JONES: From Vulcan and you could see them, they knew how to skip and you
know, oh boy, they would turn and oh they were just wow, yeah it was something
and then we had, at Christmas time when we'd be up on Loveless, Richard Perkins
lived on Loveless and so that meant his car was already on Loveless. So we would
form a train in the back of his car and he would make it go zig zag and we would
all be holding onto one another, you know, trying to keep from falling, almost
killing ourselves, didn't know though. We didn't know. Yeah, but it was fun.
Always something to do.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: You mentioned having a skate train like that. My grandfather
said that they would do the same thing when they were little and he said one
time they were, he said they didn't use a car but they would have someone in
front kind of guiding the rest and they'd be going along and he said one time
one of them at the end ended up hitting a rock or something and said that you
know he fell down and said that at that time an ambulance drove by and the
driver of the ambulance, he got out, looked at the kid, said "He's fine," got
back in the ambulance and drove off. (laughs)

LINDA JONES: Oh my goodness, oh my goodness.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And they I mean they said he was OK but then you think "Well
gosh, you know you're an ambulance driver."

LINDA JONES: Yeah why don't you take him to the hospital, that's right, I know.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Yeah, but I guess it was just a different time.

LINDA JONES: It was just a different time. Now you'd run to the hospital for
things that they run to the hospital for today. I remember my neighbor was
throwing, her name was Evelyn, and they had this big cherry tree next door to
where my grandmamma lived. It had the biggest, blackest, juiciest cherries and
so you know, you'd have to throw something up there to make the cherries fall
but the stick that she was throwing with had a nail in it and when the stick
came down it stuck her in the palm of her hand and my grandmamma pulled the nail
and the stick from out of her hand, poured some kerosene down in there, wrapped
it up and told her to go home and tell her mama.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: My word!

LINDA JONES: I know, I know. Well we had doctors over in Homewood. We had Dr.
Waldo and Dr. Hodo that you could go to, but it had to be serious you know,
because I still have the scar where I fell in a manhole and you could see the
white of my skin just, and my grandmother just pulled it tighter together after
she cleaned it up. She poured kerosene on everything and she cleaned it up with
the kerosene and all and closed it together right tight and she put a coin on
it, I think, I can't remember whether it was a penny or a nickel, but I guess it
was a nickel and whatever was in the coin would draw the poison or whatever out
and that's all she did and she checked on it every day and here I am.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Never saw a doctor about it?

LINDA JONES: No, not about that, no, no. And my uncle, he could make, he worked,
he was the, he worked on the garbage truck for the city of Homewood, Johnny
Skipper, and he could make like casts, like if someone broke their arm or foot
or leg or whatever, he made casts out of clay. You know, clay was all up there
on the hill in Rosedale. He would get chunks of clay, stir it up real soft in
that kerosene or whatever he was using and he'd have about two or things in
there, I don't know, but the clay was the main ingredient, and he'd put it on
your injury, and it'd grow back.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And that was it?

LINDA JONES: Yeah, and whatever was in it would draw the bones back together,
you know, and draw everything back together.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Now where did he learn how to do that?

LINDA JONES: I don't know. Well see they brought a lot of stuff back from Africa
and when I was a little girl they were still using those methods, you know, so
he probably knew that from back then and because my grandmother, she used to
grow mint, you know that you cook with and put in your tea, well she just drew
it in the backyard, but the mint was used with some other kind of roots that she
grew in the backyard and you put all the stuff together and it made a medicine
and when anybody got sick, you know, it was also mixed with white liquor.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Well that helped too (laughs).

LINDA JONES: Oh yeah I'm sure it did and she kept it in the closet way up high
and so whatever kind of sickness you had, you took some of that and went to bed
and if you had a cold or was really sick, she kept tallow, and tallow is made
out of animal fat, I don't know exactly what, I should have gotten some of this
stuff written down but during that time I thought it was just old fashioned and
I wanted no parts of it because I remember being sick with the cold and she'd
heat that tallow up real hot and rub it on me and put me under some thick covers
and the next morning she would say "How are you feeling?" I'd say "I'm well. I
am well. I am doing fine" because I didn't want any of that. I didn't want any
of that medicine, I didn't want any more of that tallow. I pretended I was well
until I got well.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Say "Don't put any more of that on me." (laughs)

LINDA JONES: That's right, that's right. And my mother gave us cod liver oil
every day. A tablespoon of cod liver oil and she said that she was not going to
give us castor oil because her mother made them take castor oil every day and
she said she wouldn't put us through that.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: When she was growing up she would do...

LINDA JONES: Yes, so when we were growing up we took the cod liver oil and I was
like "This couldn't be much better", but she claimed it was so much better.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Well that makes you wonder how bad was the castor oil?

LINDA JONES: I know, I know.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: It sounded like too, that y'all had a lot of, you know
mentioning things like, you know, growing stuff in your hard, having a garden...

LINDA JONES: Yes, yes. People always grew stuff and canned stuff, grew stuff all
summer and you canned stuff for the winter and people always had like tea cakes.
That's some cake, cookie something in between a cookie and a cake. It's like a
fat cookie and it would keep, make those, and keep them on the stove all the
time for your snack. That's what your snack was, a tea cake, unless you wanted
to eat some buttermilk and cornbread and, you know, there was always fruit
around because fruit trees and stuff.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Did y'all have a garden in your yard?

LINDA JONES: Mmhmm. Everybody used to have gardens and apple trees and pear trees.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Man, better than store bought probably.

LINDA JONES: And then for some strange reason, I don't know why this is not
around now, there were an abundance of plum trees, I mean, fat, juicy plums that
you could just pull off of the vines anytime. I mean, plums and black berries
and strawberries would grow wild all over Rosedale anywhere, so you could, you
know, you always had something to eat.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: You could pick those and make some marmalade or a pie or cobbler.

LINDA JONES: Yes, mmhmm. They did.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Man that would be good.

LINDA JONES: Yeah, they did. Yeah they picked the apples in the summer and make
apple butter out of them for the winter and stuff like that and canned, they
would can peaches for the winter. Mmhmm.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And y'all would, would y'all, you know, borrow groceries and
things like that, say I need you know tomatoes or something like that or eggs or--?

LINDA JONES: I'm sure that they did. I'm sure that they did.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: I remember Mr. Ramsey saying someone would, say that you know
back then, you didn't have to lock the door.

LINDA JONES: No, we didn't. We didn't lock the door. You just closed the door
and if you wasn't at home, if you were going to the country or somewhere, you
could lock it with the skeleton key but it didn't make no difference because
everybody had a skeleton key, so.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: They'd just come right up.

LINDA JONES: Uh-huh and then when they'd lock the screen door, everybody had a
hole through the screen door, you could just do that and open up the screen
door, you know. Yeah, so it was not a lot of privacy. You could, if you didn't
have a TV, you could always just go over to someone else's house and sit down
and look at TV. If you didn't have a telephone, you could go over to somebody's
house and use the telephone, and so, you know it was always, one lady, Ms.
Cunningham, she fried chicken every Wednesday night and whoever wanted to come
and eat some chicken could come.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Yum, homemade. Making me hungry.

LINDA JONES: She did, she loved frying chicken every Wednesday night and we had
a lot of fishermen in the neighborhood and they would catch fish and sell it on
Fridays, you know. Yeah, my momma used to buy fish on Friday nights and, on
Friday evening, and I remember when she used to by the catfish it would still be
breathing and she would take a pair of pliers and pull the skin off of the
catfish and I would say "Yuck, I don't want any of that," but after she fried it
up it was good.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Oh yeah, it's, I remember, my cousin's family, they have a
catfish pond down in Dadeville and I thought the same thing, because they would
catch them out of there and you'd see them skin it and think "Ugh" but yeah
once, it was a different, you were singing a different tune once you could smell
it frying.

LINDA JONES: That's right, that's right.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: But yeah, I mean, you know, I mean it sounds like it was just a
very close knit, you know neighborly place.

LINDA JONES: Fun and you know I didn't think of it as fun then. I just thought
of it was a way of life. I knew it was interesting and fun but when I look back
at neighborhoods now that don't do the things that we did, wasn't brought up
under the circumstances that we were brought up under, I said "Wow, you know,
it's a little different over in Rosedale" because if you wanted to buy new
clothes or extra clothes, you could always work, you know. It was, if you wanted
some money, work, you know, and it was not, you know, no such thing as a
shortage of jobs. It was always something that you could do.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: And a lot of times, I mean, nowadays, you know, neighborhoods,
you can live in a neighborhood and not even know who your neighbor is, not even
know their names, but I mean it sounds like that was not the case at all, that
everybody knew everybody.

LINDA JONES: No, that was not the case and I remember when I was growing up, all
the dishwashers, all the maids, all the yard workers, all the chauffeurs and
several other jobs, all those were black. You didn't, if you, you didn't see
anybody doing those jobs except black people and then as I got older, coming on
into adulthood, I saw a change, you know a shift.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Because Rosedale, it's been primarily a black neighborhood.

LINDA JONES: Yes, yes, but, um, also it was a neighborhood where Vestavia and
Mountain Brook knew that they could get workers for their homes and their
businesses from Rosedale. I mean, some people worked, like in the plants and in
the coal mines and even the railroad, but for the most part, they worked over
the mountain. That's what they called it, because there were like ranches and
things over the mountain that they could work on and just all sorts of things
over the mountains.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Over towards...

LINDA JONES: Mountain Brook and Vestavia.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: OK. Did, you had mentioned over the mountain and then I guess
kind of going the opposite direction, like over Red Mountain towards downtown,
did y'all ever go to downtown Birmingham growing up?

LINDA JONES: Not really, we bought our shoes and clothes in Homewood, in
downtown Homewood, and it was only after they closed the theater that we started
going downtown to the theaters.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: I mean otherwise everything's right there.

LINDA JONES: Yeah, that's right.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: I mean did you even have to hop in your car or could you walk
to everywhere?

LINDA JONES: To Homewood, up in Homewood? Yeah, people, you didn't need a car
unless you were a man that had a job somewhere else, but you didn't, people
didn't necessarily need a car and people didn't have cars all the time and if
they had a car it was the man that had the car and seldom would you see his wife
and children in the car because we could walk to the center and walk up in
Homewood and walk to church, you know.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: I imagine that's convenient, just being able to walk, you know,
if you need groceries or shoes or whatever it is.

LINDA JONES: That's right, we would walk to Damon Lee if we needed vegetables.
If we needed candy, we could walk to Charlie's store and if we needed some pig
feet you could go over to E.P.'s store, you know so everything was in walking
distance. Now these children nowadays probably wouldn't say that, but I thought
nothing of walking off that hill and walking back up that hill or riding my
bicycle down and then pushing it back up the hill. I thought nothing of it.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Yeah, just normal for you.

LINDA JONES: Mmhmm and my bicycle was my bicycle. I still had the same bicycle
from the time I was seven until. It was my bicycle and that was the same way
with folks' cars when they got a car. You knew, that's right, that was their car.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: I imagine, that's a, for a kid, I mean, getting a bike, that's
a big deal.

LINDA JONES: Oh yes, oh yes, but you only get but one.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: I think, I think that's all I got unless there's anything else
that you want to talk about or address on Rosedale.

LINDA JONES: Well no I think you've probably hit on everything and, you know,
it's, Rosedale, like I said, in less than twenty years, it will be gone, but it
will never be forgotten. The people who were there, they're just, that's just
the way they are. They will always have something to commemorate Rosedale.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Yeah and that's something I mean that, doing interviews like
this, the whole reason of doing oral histories is to keep those memories alive,
so you know I, if anything, I hope that these help with doing that.

LINDA JONES: I can see years from now, coming up here and getting the oral
history and listening to it in church and letting our children hear where we
came from.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Yeah and too, I remember, did, y'all were talking about
pictures or videos that someone was supposed to have. Did y'all figure out who
that was?

LINDA JONES: Yeah, well, someone said that the pictures that, you know, they
were on this reel, you know he took them like that, someone said that if we find
them, as soon as we open up, open them up, they'll disintegrate, so we're still
searching for them though. Hoping that there's a way to keep them.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Yeah, I wonder if, I wonder if someone either at the library
here or downtown would know of a way to preserve...

LINDA JONES: I think we, oh, to preserve them, maybe they will.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: To somehow, to where they wouldn't evaporate or dissolve, if
there were some way to maybe digitize them or put them on a computer or something...

LINDA JONES: That would be wonderful.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Because I mean the pictures, they would be, you know,
invaluable, just a treasure.

LINDA JONES: Mmhmm it would.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: But yeah, I mean if we, you know, think of anything else that I
forgot to ask or something, of course we got your number and can stay in touch
and everything.

LINDA JONES: Alright I appreciate you all doing this. That's wonderful.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: Oh yeah, if anything it's fun.

LINDA JONES: Yes it is.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: I could have listened to Ms. Pope all day.

LINDA JONES: I know, she's a character.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: She is funny. She told me about when, when they were
cheerleaders and you were talking about the uniforms earlier and she said "You
couldn't tell us anything." (laughs) She said "We thought we were the be all,
end all." (laughs)

LINDA JONES: Oh yes.

CHASE TRAUTWEIN: But that was a fun, she had a lot of good stories.

LINDA JONES: Oh yes.

Audio Information
Attribute	Value
Interviewer	Chase Trauwein
Interviewee	Linda Jones
Repository	Samford University Oral History Collection
Collection	STORI Collection
Accession	SUHist/Rosedale/001

Linda Jones

Chapters

Growing Up in Rosedale

Rosedale Community: School and Church

Rosedale Community: Stores, Businesses, and Restaurants

Changes in Rosedale: Red Mountain Expressway

May Day

Leaving Rosedale

Rosedale’s Relationship with Surrounding Communities

The Future of Rosedale

Rosedale Memories: Entertainment

Rosedale Memories: Home Remedies

Rosedale Memories: Community

Transcript

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