- Collection:
- Oral Histories of the American South: The Civil Rights Movement
- Title:
- Oral history interview with Oscar Dearmont Baker, June 1977
- Creator:
- Baker, Oscar Dearmont
- Contributor to Resource:
- Dilley, Patty
Southern Oral History Program - Date of Original:
- 1977-06
- Subject:
- Furniture workers--North Carolina--Conover
African American men--North Carolina--Conover
Furniture workers--Employment--North Carolina--Conover
African Americans--Employment--North Carolina--Conover
Conover (N.C.)--Social conditions - People:
- Baker, Oscar Dearmont
- Location:
- United States, North Carolina, Catawba County, 35.66261, -81.21448
United States, North Carolina, Catawba County, Conover, 35.70652, -81.21869 - Medium:
- transcripts
sound recordings
oral histories (literary works) - Type:
- Text
Sound - Format:
- text/html
text/xml
audio/mpeg - Description:
- Oscar Dearmont Baker grew up in Conover, North Carolina. He left home at the age of eighteen and spent several years traveling as a railroad worker and as a groom on the horseshow circuit. By the mid-1930s, Baker returned to Conover, where he followed the family tradition of working in the furniture industry. From the mid-1930s into the 1940s, Baker worked for Conover Furniture. He describes how that company changed when ownership transferred from Walter Baker to Jim Broyhill. According to Baker, the change in ownership was largely beneficial for the workers, as evidenced by higher wages and better benefits. During those years, Baker also worked briefly for several hosiery mills. In the 1940s, Baker left factory work for a time to run a cafe with his wife. When her health declined, however, they sold their cafe, and Baker returned to work in the furniture industry, this time as a worker at the Trendline factory. Baker witnessed several failed efforts to unionize workers during his tenure there. He explains that he voted against unionization because he believed that Trendline had sufficient wages and substantial benefits, such as the pension system introduced during the early 1960s. Baker also offers his assessment on community changes in Conover. He argues that the community has undergone much growth and has seen conditions improve for African Americans.
The Civil Rights Digital Library received support from a National Leadership Grant for Libraries awarded to the University of Georgia by the Institute of Museum and Library Services for the aggregation and enhancement of partner metadata. - Metadata URL:
- http://docsouth.unc.edu/sohp/H-0110/menu.html
- Language:
- eng
- Extent:
- Title from menu page (viewed on Dec. 5, 2008).
Interview participants: Oscar Dearmont Baker, interviewee; Patty Dilley, interviewer.
Duration: 02:04:22.
This electronic edition is part of the UNC-Chapel Hill digital library, Documenting the American South. It is a part of the collection Oral histories of the American South.
Text encoded by Jennifer Joyner. Sound recordings digitized by Aaron Smithers. - Contributing Institution:
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Documenting the American South (Project)
- Rights:
-