Home

The "Mill Hill Gang" at my 8th birthday party. I am standing on the right beside the table.

Home for me is what was once termed the “mill hill.”  The “mill hill” is no longer there for me to return to. The houses were torn down and the once booming textile mill stands silent. The mill village consisted of the mill owner’s residence, a cluster of wood frame single family dwellings for the mill workers, a church, a school and a company store. The homes were owned by the men who employed them.  Everyone who lived on the “mill hill” attended the same church and the same school and bought their groceries in the company store. My dad was the minister at the little Baptist church on the “mill hill.” My memories of the mill village consist of my “little rascals” gang of friends, fierce marble tournaments, playing “Mother, may I?”  by the street lamps and getting a few pennies to go to the Shack for a cookie or ice cream. The Shack was a little store right outside the entrance to the mill where workers could buy drinks or sandwiches.  The mill whistle established the patterns for everyday life in the mill village. The mill ran three shifts 24 hours a day and the whistle told everyone when to go to work and when to go home.  Everyone’s lives were controlled by that mill whistle.  The United States Bureau of Labor reported in 1910 that “all the affairs of the mill village and the conditions of living of all the people” seemed to be “regulated by the mill company. Practically speaking, the company owns everything and controls everything, and to a large extent controls everybody in the mill village.” The mill village kept workers under their employers’ watchful eye and denied them a voice in their own affairs. The creation of the company village was intended to be seen as the benevolent philanthropic actions of the mill owner and the workers were supposed to appreciate and respect him for all he did for them.  In reality, the actions were tied to their hunger for consistent profit by ensuring employee loyalty by controlling every aspect of the workers lives. Every feature of the village was controlled by the mill management.  The buildings, street layouts, housing and parks were all the product of careful thought and planning.  It was a world unto itself.

 But the mill village was more than that for the people who lived there. It was family. Everyone knew everyone else and everyone looked out for everyone else. Windows were wide open in the hot summer months and everyone knew everyone else’s business.  We all hung together and we survived and many of us prospered and became very successful adults. But there was one thing about the mill village that really puzzled me as a child. There was one little street of one row of about 8 houses that was separated from the rest of the mill houses. That little street was at the bottom of the hill beside the railroad tracks.  The mill houses on that street were smaller and more run-down than the other mill houses. The people living on that street mostly worked for the wealthy mill owners. We never went to that little street to play and the children who lived there never came to our street to play. The families on that street didn’t go to our church and the children didn’t go to our school and I never saw them in the company store. Yet, there was someone who lived in one of those little houses that was very dear to me and I loved with all my heart. Her name was Mary Bell and I will tell you more about her in a later blog.  It was my love for Mary Bell that fed my curiosity about that street.  As a child, that little street was a mystery. We would drive by that street in the car on the way to town and I would strain looking out the window trying to see the children who lived there wondering what they were doing and especially hoping to catch a glimpse of my dear sweet Mary Bell.  I wondered what their lives were like and where they went to church and school and where did they get groceries! I wondered why they were not part of the mill village family. Why didn’t I ever see them at the Shack for cookies or ice cream ? Why couldn’t I go to Mary Bell’s house to play? I wondered if the children liked to jump rope or play “Mother May I?” like we did and why they never came to play with us under the street lamps. I often asked “why?”, but never got any answers that made any sense to me.  “Just because” and “It’s not the way it ought to be, but it’s the way it is.” rang empty. What does “just because” mean ? Why is that the way it is?  Why shouldn’t things be the way they ought to be?  Why couldn’t things just change and be right?  As a child, it all seemed so simple, so easy to fix.  Harper Lee in “To Kill A Mockingbird” said "You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view..until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it." I wanted to climb into the skin of the people who lived on that little street and I wanted to climb into the skin of the white grownups who made them live on that street. I wanted to understand. I wanted real answers.

 For me, today that street still remains a mystery. It still seems so simple to me to fix. I still wish I could crawl into people's skin and see what they are thinking and see things from their point of view for just a day so maybe I could understand. Why 50 years later are we still talking about race? Why are we having to carry signs and wear shirts that say "Black Lives Matter"? Black lives have always mattered to me. Why are our schools becoming more segregated? Why are we hearing rumblings of the KKK? Why? Why? Why? So many questions and still no answers. All I hear are empty echoes of "Just because." "Just because was not an acceptable answer then and it is not an acceptable answer now.  I just wish everyone had a Mary Bell and maybe things would be different.  We have a lot of work to do.