Oral history interview with Reverend Raymond Flemons, 2002.

              REVEREND RAYMOND FLEMONS INTERVIEW
Northern Arizona University 
Cline Library
[BEGIN TAPE 1, SIDE A]
[This is Dr.] Carol Maxwell with the African-American Pioneers in Flagstaff Project. We’re interviewing Rev. Raymond Flemons at 419 South Verde, at the Church of God in Christ in Flagstaff, Arizona. It’s May 29, 2002. 
Maxwell: Let’s go ahead and start with where you were born. Where were you born? 
Flemons: I was born in Pineland, Texas. 
Maxwell: And when was that? 
Flemons: That was 1922. Pineland, Texas, is a small little sawmill town, and the population, I guess it must have been about 800, if it’s that. Most of the people there worked on the sawmill. My father worked on the sawmill. It was twelve of us in the family, and he had to do some more side work that could feed all of us. So what he did, he went out and rented a little piece of land, and he planted a garden, what do you call it, about five acres, and he planted everything that he needed, like corn, peas, pinto beans, okra. And part of that he raised chickens, he had hogs, and goats, and all those things, that he might have enough food to feed them twelve children. And I think he did a very good job. 
Maxwell: He raised twelve children, so a household of fourteen? 
Flemons: Yes. But after the twelve children, some of us got up in size, and some of them left, and my mother died about 1952, and he married again. He got two more children by his second wife. He was still a young man. 
Maxwell: What was his name? 
Flemons: Charlie Flemons. 
Maxwell: And your mother’s name? 
Flemons: Honey Dooley Flemons. 
Maxwell: That’s an unusual name. 
Flemons: I don’t know how they got that name -maybe because my daddy called her "honey" all the time. And I guess he was a man that he liked to do a lot of work: "Honey, do this. Honey, do that." (laughter) And so this is probably where he got that name from. 
Maxwell: Do you know the name of the woman he married after your mother passed on? 
Flemons: No, I can’t remember her name. 
Maxwell: Of all those fourteen children, where did you fit in? 
Flemons: Well, me and my brother (unclear) on the farm, because here was twelve children, and it was five girls and seven boys. One of my sisters was a twin. Then after the twins was born, then I was born. So the sixth child, if that had just been one, instead of twins, I would have been the seventh. So after the twin died -didn’t live too long, but she died. And I still claim the seventh child. But when we meet up at a family reunion, they always say, "No, you’re the eighth child." All right, so I’m still claiming the seventh child. 
Maxwell: I noticed that’s how you were written up. 
Flemons: All right! 
Maxwell: So your dad would work all day at the sawmill, or was he out working in the woods? 
Flemons: He was working out in the woods. 
Maxwell: What did he do? 
Flemons: He was the guy that they.... I’ll try to explain it, because a lot of people might not know about how they do in the sawmill. Whenever they go out and cut timber, there’s no road out there, but they had a train to go out there and pick up the timber. So they had to make their own road. They had to make their own railway so far, and then they would take the horses and put them on the truck and bring them in close enough for them to load them on the train. And the train would bring them on into the little town. And his job was to maintain the railroad. And he always tried to keep it level. This here is kind of a -I couldn’t understand it too much -but they didn’t have no tractors, no whachacall these here? 
Maxwell: (unclear) 
Flemons: Things that pick up. 
Maxwell: Oh, a grader? 
Flemons: Bull.... 
Maxwell: Oh, bulldozer. 
Flemons: Yes, they didn’t have anything that digged the holes. 
Maxwell: Oh, backhoe? 
Flemons: Yes, backhoe. And put the dirt in there, or whatever the case might be. They had horses. They had a team of mules that would go out and scoop that dirt and bring it up on the runway, up on the track. And when it’d get there, he’d just grab that handle and scatter it around. See, just turn it over. But he wouldn’t dump it all in one place. And they just keep moving forward that way. And they had maybe five or six teams of mules that go out, scoop that dirt, because it’d always be one man standing at the end when that team come around with that.... I did know the name of it. And he’d just hold it in the ground until it get full, and he’d turn it loose -horse go on back to the other end. And then he come back. So that’s one thing that kind of put me back a little bit, way back. 
Maxwell: Did those mules go on their own? They just would turn them loose and they’d go back (unclear). 
Flemons: No, here’s the guy, he was driving them. But the man that was loading the -what do you call that thing? -loading it, soon as he fill it up, he just turn it loose, and the man just keep on driving; pass by my daddy, and he just grab it and dump it off and kind of scatter it around. [I think the name of the piece of equipment is a fresno. (Tr.)] 
Maxwell: To level out the roadbed? 
Flemons: Yes. See, he keep it level, and that’s the way that track was built. 
Maxwell: So he’d work on that all day, and then come home and work on the garden at night? Or did you guys do the garden? 
Flemons: He worked there all day. When he come home, and we all had chores, and we hadn’t did them chores, he would work though. 
Maxwell: Do you remember what your chores were at all? 
Flemons: Well, me and my younger brother, what we would do, we would go out and empty the food for the cattle, and the food for the horses. They have what you call.... Oh, I can’t think of it. 
Maxwell: A manger? 
Flemons: Something like a manger. We go up there and put all that hay in there and everything. Then when the other boys come in, all they do is just turn them horses loose, and they just go there and eat all night. And too, they had the girls there would milk the cows. But you know, when you small like that, it might be the girls’ job, but you want to (unclear), "I want to learn that." And I was one of them out there wanted to learn how to milk. (swish, swish) Yes. Began to say, "Raymond, why don’t you go out and milk the cows this evening?" You know, sometimes if you get started in something, and you didn’t know what was going to happen after. Then they put you to work there. I was pretty good. 
Maxwell: Good at milking the cows? 
Flemons: Yes. Let me make a demonstration. 
Maxwell: Go ahead. 
Flemons: See, I get down there with my bucket on my knees there, get the tits on that cow (swish, swish, swish), you can hear that milk hitting that bucket (swish, swish, swish, swish). 
Maxwell: That’s great, thank you. You close it off with your thumb when you squeeze? 
Flemons: Yes. Every time you come up, you cut it off (swish, swish, swish), doing it with both hands. Them cows bags, oh! let me tell ya’! 
Maxwell: What kind of cows did you have? 
Flemons: They had Jersey cows, (unclear) give a lot, and give a lot of butter. 
Maxwell: And those were your family cows? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: Did you have pasture land on that land there? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: In this program, tell me again what this was called. This appreciation for you and your wife. Your thirty-first anniversary here at the church. They talked about you carrying the lamp to light the way for your mom and sisters to go to church? 
Flemons: Yes. My mother always was a saved woman, but my daddy wasn’t. She would always want somebody to go with her. In a small town like that, they didn’t have lights all over the city -they just had a few lights on that post, and most of the place was dark. (unclear) light (unclear) because of going through the dark spot. And she say, "Raymond, go in there and put new oil in the lamp and get it lit, and so we’ll take off to church." And after church was over, we come back. Now, the others, they wasn’t too particular about going to church, but Mama would always call me to carry the light. And so I be crying sometimes, "Mama, how come I got to carry the light all the time?" But it was something on the inside of me, I just wanted to be close to Mama anyway, and whatever she’d say, I’d go on and do it. 
Maxwell: And so you went with the lamp, your mom and your sisters and you? 
Flemons: Well, that’s with the light, leaving from the old house -not actually physically, or whatever to say, but a mentalist standpoint, a spiritual meaning, because I was the first one that actually really got saved during that time, among in our family. I was Mama’s little boy, got a little Bible under my hand. 
Maxwell: So how old were you when you started going to church? 
Flemons: I was, I guess, about six when I first started with my mama -I was about six years old. I hadn’t started to school at this particular time. And of course during that time you had to be six years old to register in school. 
Maxwell: What church was it? 
Flemons: Church of God in Christ. 
Maxwell: Oh, same as this one. 
Flemons: Yes. I’ve been around a long time. 
Maxwell: Yes. I was thinking, wasn’t Pineland where Mr. Brooks grew up, too? 
Flemons: You mean where is he from? 
Maxwell: Yes. 
Flemons: Mr. Brooks, he was from, I think it was a little town called Brooklyn. If it wasn’t that, it was Hemphill. They were surrounding Pineland. 
Maxwell: Okay, it was the outlying (unclear) outlying. 
Flemons: Uh-huh. 
Maxwell: Okay, because I remembered him telling me a story when he was little, and I didn’t know if you two were approximately the same age. I didn’t know if you’d seen this too. But he went into town one time with his dad, and his other relatives, and they had men hanging from all the lampposts in the city square. I didn’t know if you remembered that incident or not. 
Flemons: He must have been talking about Hemphill. 
Maxwell: Was that where that happened? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: Did that happen more than once? 
Flemons: I only know that it happened once. 
Maxwell: You remember it too, then? 
Flemons: Yes. And ‘ saying he’s closer to Vinedale, a little ‘ol place out there called.... I can’t think of the name. I don’t know what this black man had done, but he run up in the church [arbor?], and they got him out of that church arbor and they drug him from Kooch, all the way into Jasville and around. Just a lot of things they did. And so that was something to actually see. Now, the way I see it sometimes a lot of things down there wouldn’t have been as bad if they had had the police enforcement that was concerned about the citizens of their town. But it seemed like the police and the sheriff and whatever, and all the mayor and everything, they get with whoever was doing it because of the (unclear) black person. And so that’s one thing that I’ve always been a person that I don’t believe everybody is -I still don’t believe everybody is criminals, but I don’t believe everybody would do such things as some folks was doing down there. I felt there were some folks that was nice. And some of them that didn’t [par]ticipate in that, but they just set back and they just wouldn’t do nothing to stop it. You know, that’s life itself. 
Maxwell: Do you think those people were afraid too, afraid to interfere? 
Flemons: I’ll tell you the way they were, almost like some of these folks in a movie. Whether they’re afraid to say it or not, they just get with the crowd. You know how some folks, "Yes! Yes!" You know, "Beat ‘im up! Beat ‘im up!" saying like that. And that’s what a lot of them would do, and then they say, after it’s all over, "You know, they shouldn’t have did that. I understand how you feel, Ray. They shouldn’t have did that." But, they didn’t do nothing about it. But they was there hollering just because I want to be with the crowd, and I don’t want to stand in that crowd. I want to be in the "in" crowd. You know how folks say, "Hey! I want to be in the in crowd." If you step out there by yourself, there’s probably somebody, "Man, you ain’t helping us here with the trouble." Okay. 
Maxwell: Yes that makes sense. It’s not very honorable or anything, but I understand what you’re saying. When you were growing up, how did that make you feel, to know that that was around you? 
Flemons: You know, when you’re small, you look at things -especially something really bad that never will get out of your system, and you want to hate everybody that look that way, or hate everybody that’s wearing such type of uniform. But I found out in the South that you have to use wisdom -not all the time you’re afraid, but you have to use wisdom. And you know ain’t nothing you could do about it, or either -all you’re doing is harming yourself, because you’re overpowered. So you have to suffer things and go on hoping some day that God would make a change. And so my mother was a praying woman. She prayed. She liked to pray all the time. And she said to me, "I hear folks talking about me, I’m going to see about you. I’m going to have to go getcha." She said, "Honey, you can’t stop folks from talking about you." But these words always stay [with me], "You can’t stop folks from talking about you, but one thing you can do, is you can not let it be true." And she made a little parable. She said, "You see that bird flying up there?" I said, "Yes, Mama." She said, "If that bird decides to build a nest on your head, would you let it?" I said, "No." (unclear) can’t do that. You can’t stop folks from talking about you, but you can stop it from being true. You can’t stop the birds from flying over your head, but you can stop him from building a nest in your head. You know, these are some of the things that make folks think, and I call it the wisdom my mother had. She always had something to make her way a little bit different. 
Maxwell: I’m just wondering what role the church might have played in all of that, in her wisdom. Do you think that was related to her religion, or just straight-out wisdom? 
Flemons: No, it wasn’t related to religion at that particular time. It just some type of hatred. And I believe some of it is the way the folks brought up, and the way they was taught. If I was taught that I was better than you, and then when I see you coming, I might say something, or might laugh or go on. Okay, you might keep walking. "Hey, don’t you walk off and leave me. I’m talking to you." And then when the thing really happen, you turn around and knock me down, because you got feeling like (unclear) it’s not religion, I guess somebody just don’t hate one person. And I found out this.... Hope I’m not talking too much. I found out this: If you are doing something in a community, you got one person in there that’s always starting up a lot of confusion, and always stealing and breaking in houses. Sooner or later, that person’s going to gain the influence of the others that’s around him. And they would actually feel that, "Oh, ‘Bob,’ he’s a tough guy. I ain’t going to fool with him." And Bob says, "C’mon, let’s go." And then I’m one of the scared guys, I’m going to stay way back there. "Man, you come out here. You scart?" Then I just walk along. And then the crowd, you know, might not be but five folks in that crowd that really want to do it, but the others, they go along just to see what is going to be done. And I found out that’s what actually happened down there. When we started praying and having church, sometime they come in and they throw a few rocks and whatever the case might be, but I don’t think that was the issue. Just somebody that want to do something. 
Maxwell: They’d even attack you at church, though? 
Flemons: No, they wouldn’t attack us, they just throw a rock through the window, break a window out -kids, you know. But if the parents don’t teach a child -see, that’s my thing, "bring a child up in the way it should go, and when it’s old, it would not depart from it." If you teach your child right, and give them the Tenth Commandment, that that thing’s going to settle in their heart, and when they go to do something wrong, really, He’s going to touch them. You’re bringing up, you going to give you the sense of, "I’m wrong," and you’ll feel guilty. For an example, being out here on the highway driving (unclear) them big cars and the speed limit say 75 miles an hour, and you drive 65 miles an hour. But when you pass 75 miles an hour, you’re going to look around on the side, you’re going to look back, you’re going to check the rear [view] mirror and say, "I don’t see no police around," you just stay up there. Okay. But if you see a car coming with (unclear) and siren, you get off the gas. So that’s the way teaching is to people. because if they’re taught the things they should not do, then when something happen, they say, "Well, I know I ain’t supposed to do this." 
Maxwell: And those kids that were throwing the rocks, they weren’t being taught that that was wrong? 
Flemons: No. If they were taught, and they did that, their conscience would work on them. Okay? But they just passed there and said, "Oh, I’m just going to throw a rock in the place." No reason. A lot of children do things with no reason at all. I mean, even kids fourteen, fifteen years old. They might pass a school and say, "Hey, man! I’m going to a throw a rock through there." "Oh, you can’t throw that far." It’s something that triggers folks off to do something. But after they do it, they’re sorry, because they got something in their heart. 
Maxwell: So how old were you when you left Pineland? 
Flemons: I was eighteen, and I went in the army, from Pineland, Texas. I went in the service and I stayed in service from -well, I was in there about forty-two months. 
Maxwell: Just about three-and-a-half years? 
Flemons: Yes. See, because when I came out, I must have been about twenty-four. I was about nineteen when I went in, and I was about twenty-four years old. As soon as I got out, came back home. And then I left and went to L.A. (unclear) going to California. I wanted to go to L.A. too. But my wife didn’t want to go. 
Maxwell: You were married then? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: She didn’t want to go. I said, "Well, I’m going to go out there and just look around." So I looked around, then she came out later. She decided she didn’t want to stay, so she came back home. I can understand, when you live around your people so long, it’s hard to break away. And if they ain’t somewhere where you can make it there in one day, (emotionally) "I’m too far from...." You know. I cried a lot when I was in the army, too, because I couldn’t get back. But I had to stay there because of the situation. (unclear) lot of time we got to think of the situation, we got to think about what we have to do, and we got to use wisdom on how we going to do it. We have to do it. Because (unclear), "Well, I’m going home, regardless." No, you can’t go, because of the laws and (unclear) have you there. So the first thing you’ve got to do, you’ve got to make up your mind what you’re going to do, whether you’re going to stay, or whether you’re going to try to go and suffer the consequence. So you make up your mind, and then if you can’t make it up, I declare -I declare unto you, prayer -a lot of folks might not believe in prayer, but I tell you, prayer is the answer to most of the problems that folks have. And if we pray and ask God to help us and take us through it, he will do it. He will do it, because he brought me through. He brought me through. 
Maxwell: What part of the army were you in? 
Flemons: I was in the engineers. We went out on fields of work. See, we worked out there, we built runways. And we built different things for the planes to come in and make their landings. It wasn’t an easy thing to do. And when you’re out in an open field, and the Japanese come down, bombing, you got to try to find somewhere to go. And most of the time you can’t run across a runway to find a hole to get in. And God’s going to have to be there to help you. And then bombs just falling all around you. And then when you go get in a fox hole at night, it’s the same thing. You just land up in a fox hole, you can’t run. And a lot of the folks that was with me, when they dropped them bombs, they dropped them dead in the fox hole. And the guns that was shooting around them, they would drop that bomb right on top of those guns, eighteen folks was on the gun, get killed. But I thank God. (unclear) "I got back, I didn’t pray. I’m okay, I was okay over there, Ray, and I didn’t pray." "That was you, but I know that if I pray, God will answer prayer." And so when I got back home, I let him know, "Lord, I thank you." There’s a lot of time we just say, "Oh...." It’s something we take for granted. You know how your children grow up with you, and you say, "I want you to go do something (unclear)." He says, (reluctantly) "Okay, I’ll go." And then you come back (unclear) pair of shoes, "Dad, I want a pair of shoes." "Okay, go out there and do what I say first." And then he (grumbles). "I don’t have to work for no shoes, do I?" I said, "Sure you’re going to have to work. That’s because the world don’t owe you nothing out there. You’re going to work for everything you get." See, sometimes the way you teach children, that they wongt take things for granted. "I’m supposed to have that." And they can’t have everything. 
Maxwell: Which unit in the army were you in? The number, the regiment, or whatever. 
Flemons: It’s three.... Oh, I got all them signs out. It’s the third.... Third Air Force. I can’t.... 
Maxwell: Oh, you were with the air force? 
Flemons: Yes, see, because what we were doing, we were making the way for them, wherever we land, we had to go and try to build an airstrip and whatever the case might be. 
Maxwell: Do you remember where they sent you? 
Flemons: New Guinea. (laughs) First we landed in.... Well, the first little town we made it to was Ah-Ee-Shima [phonetic], and not very far from that was Iwo Jima. That’s where them.... I wish I could get that right. For all the Marines (blank tape, half a second) got killed in Iwo Jima. Remember that? 
Maxwell: Yes. 
Flemons: And we weren’t very far from that. And then we went back to the Philippines. And then from the Philippines down to.... But anyway, we got down there, and that’s where really the war started with us and Jim Butler. Jim Butler was Iwo Jima -no, Ah-Ee-Shima, that’s where it was, Ah-Ee-Shima. 
[END TAPE 1, SIDE A; BEGIN SIDE B] 
Flemons: And General Butler was there, and so many Japanese around that island, and they was trying to get them off. And they were just banging and shooting and shooting. And finally, they had just about got them off the island, and I don’t know where the bomb come, or how they shot, they killed General Butler just before we took that little island. And it was something to thank God, to be back. 
Maxwell: Sounds like it. Sounds like it would be pretty terrifying to be making a runway, so you’re making it smooth, and since you’re making it smooth, there’s no place to get in, and have airplanes come over. That sounds pretty frightening. And so you came back to Pineland, and then you and your wife went to L.A.? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: And what was her name? 
Flemons: Mary Ann Hunter. 
Maxwell: Then you went out to L.A., and she came back home to Pineland? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: And then did you have any kids with her? 
Flemons: No, we didn’t have any. 
Maxwell: And then what happened? 
Flemons: Well, after I was there for a while.... I stayed in L.A., I was still in L.A. And so she came on back, and I met another young lady during that time. No, I stayed in L.A. for about two years, and then I came back here. That’s where I met my wife I got now, here. 
Maxwell: Didn’t you study for the ministry in L.A.? 
Flemons: Yes. In L.A., when I really had a feeling of my calling, that’s the time I just went into classes. I didn’t go to seminary or nothing of no kind. We went into classes, and I studied, because I feel that if the Lord want me to do something, I want to be able to try to reach somebody. With what was down in my heart, I thought I could take on the whole world. You know, "God, come on! let’s do it!" But, you see, when you get started, you got to know a little bit more than just say "Hey, thank you, Jesus." And so I went in and I studied my Bible. And then I wasn’t preaching in L.A., I just studied my Bible. But I had the feeling. And my brother, he was here. Everybody was in the shipyards, working. Shipyard’s started to cutting out, you know, I’m still in L.A. And my brother said, "Hey, how are the jobs over there?" I said, "Well, shipyards is cutting out. I guess I’ll have to do something different, they’re going to shut us down." But I was still working. He said, "Come on over here to Flagstaff." When he said flag ... staff ... a pole with a flag on it? Oh, man! Trip me out! I done been to L.A. a little bit, I kinda knew my way around. And he said, "Why don’t you just come over?" I said, "Okay." Well, I wasn’t really intending to come. But I laid down that night after he had talked to me, and all of a sudden, just about the time I was going to  -I got into bed (yawns), and I looked up. Before I could cut the light off, the light went off. I said, "Wait a minute. It’s dark, there’s no light. I didn’t cut that light off." I put the cover over my head. The light’s still gone. Put it over again. I said, "I can’t understand this." Then I just kept it over my head. The light come back on. I said, "Now, Lord, what is this?" And the only thing I could see is me catching that train, coming to Flagstaff. And a lot of folks hear me tell that. I was just kind of shucking around with him, you know, "I’m coming," you know. But after the Lord got through showing me the lights and whatever, I got up. That was on Friday. I got home from work that Friday evening, got my check, come on that Saturday morning, and I went down to the train station, packed my little things up, told everybody, "Hey, I’m leaving." "Where you going?" "I’m going to Flagstaff." "Flag! Staff!?" (laughter) I said, "Yes!" "What is that, a little flagpole?" I said, "I don’t know what’s there, but I’m going to Flagstaff." I got on that train, and that Sunday morning, that train drove into Flagstaff. "Choo! Choo!" and I’m looking at the houses all around there. Just a very few was there along Santa Fe and north of town. Most of the black people and the Mexican people lived over here on the South Side. And so I got off the train, looking around, seeing what I’m going to do, and that train (choo, choo) pulled off. And it pulled off, I asked one guy, "Say, where is...." I’m use to, you know, (unclear). "Where is the black folks live here in this town?" He said, "Just turn and go down there, and go right, and go on down that street and you’ll find them down there." I said, "Yes?" "Yes, they’ll mostly be at the nightclub down there." "Okay." I walked on down there. That little old place was called Pearlgs Fountain. (laughs) I said, "What?!" I guess about fifteen people could get in there. I told them who I was looking for. They said, "Well, he lives over there." How long ygall been here? 
Maxwell: Me? Since g96. 
Flemons: Oh, you wouldn’t know. "... over in the gDobe Quarters." They had a place there where they had gdobe. 
Maxwell: Yes, I heard that name. Where was that? 
Flemons: The gDobe Quarters, that’s where my brother was living. The houses were built out of adobe. So I walked on around there, and I see him, "Hey! how you doing? You made it all right!" I said, "Yes, I made it." And so we set there and talked a while, and he said, "Hey, you going to work with me tomorrow?" I said, "Well, I’ll go out there and look around." You’re going to have to cut part of this out. (laughs) 
Maxwell: That’s all right, this is perfect. This is exactly what I want to hear. 
Flemons: I said, "I’ll go out there and look around." I had one of those little tee shirts on. He said, "You want to look for a job?" I said, "Yes, I’ll go out there with you." I went out there and they were just stacking that lumber. A saw was splitting big pieces into boards. And they were just stacking it, putting a sticker, and then taking it over somewhere to dry. And so I’m standing there, here come the big boss man. The boss man come out there, I never will forget, his name was Johnson. I can’t get his first name. Wore a big hat. He said, "Everybody going to work?" I didn’t say nothing, everybodygs working. He said, "You! go to work here!" I said, "Me?!" He said, "Don’t you want to work? Get over there and go to work." No examination, no nothing. You just go to work. My brother give me some gloves so I could get over there and go to work. So I went on to work. And the first paycheck (chuckles), I told (unclear), "I think I’ll stay here for a while." (laughter) "Yes, I’ll stay here for a little while." 
Maxwell: It was good pay then? 
Flemons: Oh, it wasn’t no good pay, but you know, when you only make a little money different places out there, and then they fixing to shut you down. And then coming from Texas to the army, and then around. In Texas they didn’t pay that much. But they was paying a little bit more, because when I started to work here, they was only paying -it mighta been two-something. Yes, I think I started work, I worked days, and then they needed somebody to work at night, I’d work at night. And all this stuff. I walked down the street on Sunday morning, yes! shake my pocket. (laughter) I thought I had some money! (unclear) Then after that I worked there and I got moved from there to the position of driving the lift truck. See, that truck [follows?] the lumber and picks it up and takes it to the mill up there, where they take it up, say, and they stack it. Then when I left there, I decided to do something a little bit different. Well, I stayed there a long time, but during the time I was there, I guess I call it a good job, because I didn’t have to get down on the ground for nothing. (unclear) "Hey, you come on (unclear)." And I say, "Hey, wake up!" And all of a sudden I decided that since I’m going to stay here in Flagstaff, I want to build a house." Me and my wife, she was working and I was working. "I’m going to build a house." because I thought about my daddy back in Texas, he could get a couple of boards and things and stick them on the ground here, and stick them on the ground there, and [four over there?]. He started putting lumber around it, and then after a while he got a box, and then he got a brace, and then after a while he got the top, and he got a house. It wasn’t but one room, but he got a house. I said, "Heck, I can do it." And so Mr. Johnson, he always would give me a lot of that old lumber. I said, "I’m going to build me a house, Mr. Johnson." He said, "Well, if you want that old lumber out there, we’re just burning it up," to put the fire in the kiln -it wasn’t a kiln. I said, "Okay, I’ll do that." And I wait until they get some pretty good lumber, you know, I was going to pick it out and stack it up, take it over there by where I’m going to build my house. And I have it all setting out there. It wasn’t all smooth lumber, it was rough -not smooth lumber. I know he wasn’t going to give me no smooth lumber, so I’m going to make use of what he give me. I got it all piled up there, and I said, "Now, I’m going to build a house." Me and my wife set there, we looked in the catalog, we looked in the magazine." "Oh, my!" she said, "This is the house I want, right here." I said, "Oh? That’s a big house. Three bedrooms, a dining room, living room, two baths." I said, "No, we ain’t got that kind of money." And so what I did, I kept on getting my lumber, and then we decided we’re going to first now and build a foundation. You know how you do that. I went there -well, I went and bought me a car. I bought a 1950 Ford, brand new. I’m Mister Flemons! (laughter) See, what I’m trying to say, you can do what you want to do, if you set your mind to do it. If I’d have went uptown there and asked them guys for a job somewhere up there, at the secretary’s office, or working up there in the general place, and give me a job in the business, they’d just look at me and probably kicked me outta there, and I wouldn’t have blamed them, because I didn’t have no business going with that kind of job, because I wasn’t qualified for that. And so I went on and bought this little ol’ car. The main thing, whatever you do, whatever you make, save. You cannot save money when you don’t make it. But if you make it, you can save some of it. And once I got that car, I say, "Well, where you going to get some sand down here to build?" Every evening I get home from work, I got that pick, I’m digging that footer. Whew! All my friends, they said, "We’re going to help ya’, Ray, we’re going to help you when you get started." I tell them, "I’ll be working Saturday." I never worked on Sunday. (blank tape for a second or two) I don’t work on Sunday, I give that day to the Lord. I didn’t work. I might work until about ten or twelve o’clock that Saturday night. I’m digging that (unclear). Got it all dug. Now I got to try to level it up. I’m trying to find a place to stay. I’m staying in this little hut down here, and they charge me what they want. I always remember my dad always say, "Whatever you got belong to you. It might not be what the other person got, but that’s yours." And so I got it all dug. Now I got to figure out how to get some sand down there. I went and bought me a little trailer, two wheels (unclear) behind that 1950 Ford. "Man! you’re going to mess up your car!" "You’re right." I hooked it behind that ‘50 Ford, up to the Sugar Mountain, up on that hill there, going towards Grand Canyon. I loaded it up. I didn’t have enough to do very much, dumped it out. (unclear) back, dumped it out. Now, the next Saturday, we got all the boards set up, and I put a string around it. "You know, you can’t level no...." In fact, I got a little experience working in -Elmer was working with the Indians, when they were building the same thing -houses and portables. And so I got that string level. I got a string, you mighta seen the little old level. You can hang them on a string or hang them on something and try to level something. They laughed at me. "You can’t make that level with that!" I said, "Okay." I got that string, and I put it against that place, and I pulled. First I didn’t have it deep enough in the hole. And so I pull it, it come out of that hole. Okay, I’m going to drive it down again. And I pulled it real tight. It was thirty feet across the front. And I pulled it real tight. I said, "That ain’t going to work." Then I come back halfway and I pulled it again and tightened it down, put my string down there. And when I poured that footer, mixing cement, [it’s a shallow?]. And also I had a cement mixer. And I pulled it and I put my level on top of it. It was running downhill. "That’s all right, Lord, I’m going to have to sleep kinda one-sided, but that’s okay. I built for my home." And what I did, I finally got it all poured, then under the center of it, I got some of that nail kegs. Do they have them now? (tape turned off and on) 
Maxwell: You were saying how you were working on getting it level, and then you started to tell us about the nail kegs. 
Maxwell: Well, the nail kegs, they used to put nails in a keg, and you can bought a whole keg of nails. And that’s what we did. All the kegs that was empty, the wooden kegs that was empty, we took those and after we put so much cement in the ground, and keep on building a frame around, to pour cement to hold it to make a block. We set that keg on top of there and poured cement down in the keg. And so that made this block, and so we leveled that. This was under the house. Well, we had a cement foundation around the house, because we know in the city of Flagstaff in the wintertime it snows. And if we didn’t have some way to stop the wind from coming in, all the water and stuff would freeze under the house. So we knew we could set so many keg blocks under the house. And so we did that, and so I said, "Well, Lord, I thank you. You’re so wonderful." "Now I’m going to build this house for you," talking to my wife. "Lord, I’m going to build this house." And she looked at it. "I don’t see how in the world you’re going to finish all that." I said, "Well, the guys said they’re going to help me if I get the foundation and everything." "All right." And so I called the guys, "Hey, (unclear) come by and give me a hand." "Okay." I started the house in, it was somewhere in February, I believe, and kinda getting close to where guys can go shoot squirrels, you know. Everybody was going fishing and going squirrel hunting. "Man, I would help you this Saturday, but I got to go fishing. (unclear) gone to fishing, and we going to put -we’ll bring you some squirrels back." "Yes, man, bring some squirrel." So I got all the guys that was helping me, we got the two-by-sixes, not knowing that I should have two-by-eights on the house for floor joists. And so I just put them two-by-sixes on there, got them all set, and all that lumber the man give me, I just thought of laying it on there and nailing the floor. (unclear) And oh, we was going at it. Had it all nailed down, and we looked at it to see was it level, it done sagged in the center because the two-by-sixes was (unclear). Now I got to go back and reinforce them two-by-sixes to get this house going. We have to do it. And so the next Saturday come by, we got it all laid out. And (unclear) said, "Man, you done started your house yet?" (unclear) I was building a house. They could see me from the sawmill. "You done started your house yet?" I said, "No. It’s over there. Can you see it?" "No." I said to the next (unclear), "You going to help me?" "Well, whenever you get started." I said, "I done started." So the next Saturday, because we already had done started putting the frame in, but we didn’t have them righted up. We got them all nailed down on the floor. And the next Saturday we started putting them up around. And so we got halfway done, and went back to work. "Yes, man, I see you got that house started." I said, "We’re going to have a house here. Are you going to come help me?" "Well, I was thinking I’d get over there." So we get on back and nail the siding up. Now, this is where I needed some help, on the top. And so they come, and about five guys come, and we started doing the top. They was cutting the stuff down on the floor, and we was up on (unclear). That whole top of the house was built out of that scrap lumber from the sawmill. The complete house, the flooring, and around the siding was built out of that scrap lumber. And every time (unclear) Mr. Johnson would say, "You need some more of that lumber?" I’d say, "Yes, sir." "Get all you want." And finally I got the top on, and that was getting close to June. During that time, June is the time it rained -June, July, and August. We get all rain. It started raining, and (unclear) trying to put the top on. And I said, "Well, that’s all right, ain’t nothing (unclear) water go down through that, it’ll go onto the floor anyway. And so finally we got this black paper, just the black paper. I didn’t do no shingle, I just got this black paper and put it on first -felt. And then I got some more of this hear plain black paper, but it was the roofing type, and I put that on. "Ah!, I’m doing well, doing good." And setting there. "Now, what else am I going to do? I ain’t got no more money. What am I going to do?" And so all of a sudden I decided to just call this guy from Phoenix to do some siding for me. And so he come in and he said, "Well, you need some siding on that, and we got the right kind of siding for you." It looked like cement, but he made it in a bucket and stuck it on the wall. Then when it got dry, it stayed on there. And he charged me eight hundred and some dollars to put that around there. I said, "Okay, thank you Lord," but I didn’t have the money. And I went to the bank and I said, "Sir, I need to borrow some money." And the guy’s name in the bank at that time was Mr. Flemons. I can’t think of his first name now. And I went and said, "Mr. Flemons, I’d love to get some money from you." And he said, "Yes, what’s your name?" And I said, "I’m named Flemons." He said, "Oh! Well, we’re namesakes!" "Yes, sir. I need your help." And so we went on and got that from him, and then a guy put that around there, and that dried us in. But we ain’t got no floor in there yet. But I’m trying to say the Lord makes a way out of no way. 
[END TAPE 1, SIDE B; BEGIN TAPE 2, SIDE A] 
Maxwell: ... 419 South Verde at the Church of God in Christ, in Flagstaff, Arizona, for the African-American Pioneers in Flagstaff Project. Okay, let’s see, we were right in the middle of something. You’d just dried-in the house. 
Flemons: Oh, putting.... All right, what I was thinking to say about it, we borrowed this money, and we put the siding around the house. Now we’re just about ready to go inside of the house and try to.... Well, we already got it dried-in, and it’s warm in there, but we don’t have no heat, and we hadn’t run the water in it yet. And we were still working on this house. All of a sudden, we figured that if we could get out of this other house that were renting, and we could take that money and put on this house, what we’re living in. It was getting close to cold time here, really close to cold, so what we did, we fixed one room, put the glass in one room, all around, put the floor in it, and we got this little ol’ four-inch [bull?], four-inch flooring. We put that in there, and then we got the doors in that room. And then we moved in there. In the kitchen we had a partial floor, and we already done hooked up -my wife always said that she wanted an electric stove. And I said, "Good for that!" Here in Flagstaff, without wood, you just cannot keep enough wood to burn in the living room, and you burn for the kitchen. And so she wanted an electric stove. And I went up here and bought her an electric stove, and we hooked it up. 
Maxwell: Where did you buy that? 
Flemons: We bought it here in Flagstaff with the electric company, (unclear). Got that and set it up. I knew a good friend of mine that worked there at Southwest. He come over and hooked up the electric. And now, I’m working around in the house, and so we got the stove and I want to hook it up, but I said, "No, I don’t know how to do that." But I’m still working around, putting the floor down, putting the wall. We had wall paneling just like this in there. And so we just kept doing the interior, and finally we got enough light in all the rooms, and we put on this here little old floor heaters, electric heaters, like that, in the bedroom, so we have some fire in there. And now, I got to try to see how we’re going to do all of this with no money. We ain’t got no money now, so I’m setting there. Well, now we was in the house. It’s cold. We was in the house. I got a kerosene heater. Y’all remember kerosene heaters? 
Maxwell: They smell bad. 
Flemons: Yes. You get the kerosene heaters, we set them about like this. And about that wide, looking like a wood heater, more or less. But I got a big fifty-gallon drum on the outside, it run through the wall, and it comes into that heater, and it goes in there constantly. And if there’s too much going in there, that just heated red. I mean, it’s hot in there! But you gotta be very careful with that kerosene, because he can explode if he gets too much in there. And so we used that for a while. By that time, my boy, my son, he’s kinda big enough to get up and kinda walk a little bit. I went downtown and had them put me a floor furnace in -you know, with the grill you can walk right over it. They put that in. I mean, everything I get, I’m sending it toward that house, because I got to get in there. And so he was crawling around there, and he’s walking, and he stepped on that heater. You can see the prints of that on his feet, and where he fell, you can see the prints on his arm. And so I said, "Okay, we got to do something different." And I telled my son, "C’mon, walk across this heater. C’mon, c’mon." "No! No!" I told my wife, I said, "That’s a lesson he’ll never forget!" She said, "The boy got burned!" I said, "I know. Sometime we gotta get burned in order to learn a good lesson." And now I want to think about the church now. I’m going to church, have them fix my house. Got my guitar on my shoulder, on my way down to the church. And we’re trying to fix up the church and do a lot of things. And then after I was there for a while, this is the time the Lord called me to the ministry. Really had that essential, that the Lord really wanted me to do something for him. 
Maxwell: After you got the house done? 
Flemons: I ain’t got the house finished yet. 
Maxwell: Let me interrupt you a second and ask you which bank you borrowed the money from. 
Flemons: Oh, we borrowed the money from Bank of America. No it wasn’t! Arizona Bank. There was only about two banks here in town: one of them was Arizona Bank, and I think Valley Bank was here. And Mr. Flemons, at that time he was the manager of that bank. And that guy, I never will forget, he always was nice to me. Let me finish this house right quick. And so we didn’t like the way the shingle was around that house, and so we got this other guy to come. No, this was the top. We’re going to put some shingles on top of the house, because the insurance said I could get a better insurance if I had the shingles on there, not just the roll roofing. And this man come up from Phoenix, (unclear) and stuff, Mr. Allen. He said, "We’re up here, Mr. Flemons, we’re putting on shingles on the house." I said, "Yes, I sure need some." And so he set down, he pulled out his (unclear) book, he said, "Look here. We got some shingles here. This here I’ll last you twenty-five years. And these here will last you fifty years." Oh, he’s just telling me all that stuff. And I said, "Well, okay, how much would it cost?" He said, "Well, we have to figure them all out and see how much it’s going to cost." I said, "Well, okay." Then I said, "Let me call Mr. Flemons and see would he finance it for me." "I’ll go down there and talk with Mr. Flemons." He went down and talked with him, and he was telling Mr. Flemons he’s got a good record, you know, and a reference and all this, and said, "I think we could work with Mr. Flemons." So okay. And then I went down and talked with Mr. Flemons and he said, "Yes, that sounds like a good deal." I come on back, and I told him to go ahead, put the shingles on. And so he had the guy to bring the shingles right up and put them on. And so then he says to me, "Mr. Flemons said we’re going to have to have...." I think the whole thing must have been about, what we had to pay, was about $1,100, or something. He said, "What we’ll do, you’ve got a good reference. Will you go back to the bank and tell Mr. Flemons to just pay us off cash? Then all you’ll do is just send your money in to the company." I said, "That ain’t the deal we made. I said Mr. Allen told me that we’re going to run it through the bank." But this other guy, he’s the big boss, see, "I’m over Mr. Allen," and I got all the things with Mr. Allen. And I’m saying, "Huh." He kept looking at me, I kept looking at him. I don’t know why I do that -when I’m talking to [someone], I look them dead in the eye (unclear). I just like to look at folks when they’re talking to me. And I said, "You tell Mr. Allen to come back up here, I want to talk to him." "Well, I done fired Mr. Allen." I said, "Nooo, I can’t do that." And so I said, "What are you doing? because I got to have money to finish my house." And I kept a-looking at him. I said, "Let me go down to the bank and talk to Mr. Flemons and see can we work that out." And I told Mr. Flemons every detail that he come there, and here being all this talk. He said, "Mr. Flemons, don’t you give him not one quarter. Let’s check him out." And I went back and told him, I said, "Look, Mr. Flemons said we’re going to have to check you out." And he called -he called down there to the company he was working for, "You know they were trying to steal the job?" They were going to steal that job. And so he got scared, and he didn’t come back. I got that whole deal free! That guy took off, and didn’t come back at all. All that stuff (unclear). And I think the shingles were nice ones. They lasted a long time. And that’s when I said, "We’ll fix him!" 
Maxwell: Where was that house? 
Flemons: That house was built in 1952. 
Maxwell: And whereabouts was it? 
Flemons: It’s on Clay Avenue. 
Maxwell: Oh, on Clay, over there. 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: In Old Town. 
Flemons: Yes. It’s been rearranged since then. 
Maxwell: I’ll be! So you got a free roof out of it. 
Flemons: It’s up there on that house. Well, I just moved out of that house in 1998. 
Maxwell: Wow! that’s a long time. 
Flemons: Yes, (unclear). You know what my wife told me? (unclear) "I want to get a new house." And I said, "Yes, you’re going to get one." because every time she look at something that I haven’t finished, I have to tear all that out and start something else, you know. And she said, "I ain’t never lived in a house that is finished. I want to get a new house, and I don’t want you to build it." (laughter) "because I want it finished. If you build it, it won’t get finished." I said, "Okay." We bought that house up on the hill in g98. And them guys come in, and they went all through it, and they built it. And so she moved out of that house and it (unclear). She had this closet, "You never did finish the inside of the closet. And over here you never did finish. And here in the kitchen. You didn’t finish here because you had to keep changing it because...." I had all this here paneling. I’m going to tell this here, somebody hear this, they going to laugh and they going to be very [causual?]. Over there in that house, we are behind that paneling, we had roaches. I tore all that paneling out, trying to get rid of the roaches (swish! swish! swish! swish!) spraying. I look around, there’s some more roaches. I go in and turn the light on at night, and I’m going to tell you, all of those roaches was just running everywhere. I went down and I told the guy working on killing roaches, you know, the exterminator. I said, "Man, I’ve got some roaches, and are they bad!" And I have to make him laugh, you know. I said, "They bad." He said, "What you mean?" I said, "I’ll tell you what, I go in there at night, and cut the light on, they all just run. And then when I go to sleep, the captain of the roaches and all his army I hear him say (makes sound like a trumpet), and all them roaches come running. “Help yourself to what you find around here, because Mr. Flemons is asleep now." Then I woke up the next morning, they still eating. I said, "Now, somebody’s gotta do something with these roaches. I can’t do nothing with them." And he come down and he sprayed. And then I said, "I know what I’ll do," to my wife. "This paneling is going to get out of here." I pulled every bit of it out, and I took it and threw it outdoors. He said, "Now what you going to do?" I said, "I’m going to find them roaches." I got some oil base paint. You know, they don’t use too much oil base paint now. I got this oil base paint, and I sprayed, I sprayed, I sprayed. I sprayed all in the cracks. And about two weeks later, no roaches. No roaches. I mean, that’s the only thing I’ve found out kills roaches. I ain’t had no roaches in that house since. Man, we got rid of them roaches. I hope you guys that listen on here, that roach exterminator’s not going to take my idea. (laughter) So that’s what we had. Them roaches is the worst thing I ever run into. 
Maxwell: Oh, they’re horrible. 
Flemons: And some of them is called the German roaches, too. Them things will multiply overnight. 
Maxwell: Yes, they’re awful. They’re everywhere too. You were going to tell me about the loan policies, about when they loaned the money to black folks here in town, how the banks would have a little [pull?] of money. About how the banks dealt with the black people in town. 
Flemons: Oh, you mean me and this guy? 
Maxwell: Yes, how was it for you, borrowing money? 
Flemons: Oh, there’s some places here in town, I think the most money that they would loan, most of the black people, and I guess some of the majority, I guess, it wasn’t probably all the blacks, but minority people, that if you got over $800, they just won’t let you have that kind of money, unless you have some type of collateral, because most of the people, what they would do, they would take their cars, and put these cars up to get some money to make an extension on their house. But Mr. Flemons, I don’t know how he [liked?] that name, but he would go by, "Anything that you want, Ray, c’mon here, anything that you want." And so I said, "No," because I was a person that I didn’t want to get in too much debt that I couldn’t pay it off. But he was just trying to get me, "Go ahead, Ray, come on in here." And so I just said no. But they didn’t let you have too much money. And that’s the way it were in the South, too. They had a certain amount of money that they let the minorities have, because I was going to build a house. Of course they can build a little old house. They called them shotgun houses, three bedrooms and a kitchen: one, two, three. Look right straight through it on out the back door. Okay. And you can do it for about $800. You can build that house for $800. And if you go down certain places, you’ll see a whole lot of them folks out there, come out of the army, and they get their little $800 and build them a house. But now, I guess they let anybody have any amount of money you want, if they think you can pay it back. I went up there and I wanted some money, because I wanted to build me a house, and I was going to build my house -now I’m going to buy a house. (unclear) I went up there and I told that guy, "I want to borrow some money," and he said, "Well, how much do you want?" I said, "I don’t know. But I know I need $125,000." He looked at me, "What you going to do?" I said, "I see an apartment over here I want to buy. I can give them cash for $125,000, but they want $150,000 for it." And so he looked at me, he said, "Well, we’ll see what we can do." And I went back to work, and I was telling the guys, "I’m going to buy a little house." They said, "How much?" I said, "$125,000." "You must be crazy! You can’t pay that kind of money. Those folks ain’t going to let you have that kind of money." I said, (unclear). And so with the house I had, they wouldn’t loan it to me, but this lady come in, she was talking with me, "We can let you have ‘X’ number of dollars on this house, but you’ll need $40,000 more to cover the whole thing." And this guy’s setting over there holding (unclear) "Where is Ray going to get $100,000 to buy this house?" And I’m setting here waiting for them. What are you going to do? That lady worked and finally she come over here, and I called them and I said, "Okay, we’re going down to the bank, and we’re going to settle up. We got the money to pay." "Pay me cash?!" "Yes." "You’re kidding!" I said, "No. Pay you cash." Went down and she wrote him out a check, and now I got to pay that money back. But the point is, they’ll do it if you got something for collateral. I don’t use that word no more, unless they tell me. I don’t use the word. "You ain’t going to let me have this money because I’m black." No, I don’t use that word. I say something else. "You don’t like me." (laughter) I don’t use that word, because I found out in every bank they got some rules and regulations. They’ve got their laws to deal with. And there’s so much money they can let you have if your credit level done dropped down below 40 percent and all that stuff. You just can’t pay for it. You know, if you ain’t got the money to pay for it, you can’t pay for it. They won’t let me have it because.... I don’t use that. 
Maxwell: Yes, not now. 
Flemons: Not now. And I almost believe that’s what they did. I try not to believe it. (unclear) it’s real, and you say, "I just don’t believe that." Maybe it’s something else. Maybe it’s something about me you don’t like. Maybe my hair ain’t cut right or something. But sometimes it’s hard. It’s better if we can think positive on a lot of things. And in fact, it’d help us, because our minds, and give us more courage and faith to go forward if we do that. But if we (unclear) all the time, every time we see (unclear). God don’t want to deal with us always on a negative. "God, I believe you can do it, but you ain’t going to do it." No, "Lord, you might not do it, but I know you got it, I know you can do it." So these are the things that I like to really build up. 
Maxwell: You know, I forgot to ask you, what year was it when you came here to Flagstaff? 
Flemons: In 1946. 
Maxwell: You were single when you came? 
Flemons: Yes. When I came here, I was single, because my wife had come to California, and so she decided she’d go back home. "I ain’t going back out there." I said, "Well, okay." I went down there several times, saying, "Honey, come on back home with me." Then you come to a fact that if you’re not for me, why keep wasting a lot of time. And so finally I said, "Well, I’m just going to start working here." And then I met my wife on the way to church. You might have seen that. Remember? 
Maxwell: Yes, I did. 
Flemons: I met her. I didn’t fool around in [flouchy?] places, all them, when folks are down there, gambling under the trees and all that up under the bridge, got a little crap game. No. It was nothing like that. I was on my way to church. And so then finally she decided, "That guy going to church every Sunday, and he keeps inviting us to church. I’m going to go out there and see where they’re going." So she started coming to church. And so finally she was a nice person, she worked every day, and I wasn’t worried about whether she was working or not, but I just (unclear). And finally we decided, we’re going up [to prayer?] (unclear) [to eat?]. That little ol’ calf they had up there. (unclear) And then we just go out sometime and just ride on the side of the mountain and look down at Flagstaff. Just sight-seeing. 
Maxwell: Riding in a car? 
Flemons: Yes. Yes, I had a little ol’ car, and we’d just ride around. Before I got a car, when we leaved the church sometimes, we’d walk. Church was here. You can just walk home. And there’s trees and things all down through here. All this here was wooded areas, all the way back over there, going toward NAU, going back to over here where these cafés, and we just walked through there. We’d stop and set down and talk. And I mean with the very first day we got married, that Saturday we got married, come to church that Sunday, and it was snowing. And we decided we’d just walk. And you know where we walked to? Right straight down through the cemetery. I said, "What in the world are we doing here on a wedding...." (laughs) Walked right on down in the cemetery, and (unclear) snowballs, and we’re looking at all the graves and what-all. And after that, just about every year, if it snows, we remember that. We leave the church and we go walking out in the cemetery. And this last time, do you remember? I said, "Yes, but it’s been fifty years ago. I ain’t walking in no snow no mo’." (laughter) 
Maxwell: So you didn’t do it this year? 
Flemons: No, we didn’t do it this year. 
Maxwell: So this church was here in this place when you came to Flagstaff? 
Flemons: Yes. It was right on this spot of ground, but we built this church after I got here. 
Maxwell: So when you met your wife, you were already part of this church? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: Were you a member of it, or just attending? 
Flemons: Yes, I was a member, because I was working with the young people at that time. And in the afternoon, we had a young people’s service. And so she’d come and be in the young people’s service. 
Maxwell: Were there a lot of members back then? 
Flemons: No, it wasn’t a lot. 
Maxwell: A small church? 
Flemons: Yes, small. Well, there’s more blacks here now than there’ve ever been, but the churches still don’t grow like they??ve been. But I remember we used to have a lot more members at this particular church than we have now. And now they’re scattered, blacks. That’s the reason. We have here, we don’t just only have the blacks, we have Spanish and Indians here, and also.... (unclear) them other folks over there? Spanish, Indian, and white. We have white. (coughs) 
Maxwell: Do you need a drink of water? Are you okay? 
Flemons: I’m okay. 
Maxwell: Okay, because we can stop and get you a drink if you need a drink of water. 
Flemons: No, I’m okay. 
Maxwell: So you’ve got a pretty mixed congregation now? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: Can you tell me, do you know how this church got started in the first place? 
Flemons: Yes. I’ll have to go way back. 
Maxwell: That’s okay. 
Flemons: Okay, I came in ‘46. And the pastor who was here then, his name was Elder Hamilton. And he came here during the war. And what they did, he was working there at Bellemont, out at the army depot, and he was preaching. If you can picture the houses that used to be here before they really built up, they just little ol’ houses, some of them was (unclear) just built out of ‘dobe, and just picked up a little house from somewhere and brought it here, and added onto it. See, Southwest give them some, and they added on to it. 
Maxwell: Oh, like the kind they’d take out to camps, that kind? 
Flemons: Yes. Okay, so he came here and he started preaching. And he didn’t have no place to preach in. So they had a little place down on San Francisco Street. Somebody moved out of a house, and he would preach in there. And the congregation started to gathering, kind of building up. And I got a picture of the church and all them there now. And so what he did, he decided he was going to build a church. 
[END TAPE 2, SIDE A; BEGIN SIDE B] 
Flemons: The war, they was shipping it all during the war, you know, doing things for the war. They couldn’t buy very much lumber. And you couldn’t buy a whole lot of stuff you couldn’t buy. So out at Bellemont, they were building crates to ship things over, and then ship it back in. They just tear up the crate and just throw it away. So he decided he’d get all them crates -I guess (unclear) -get all them crates, and the commander give them to him. And they hauled all that stuff over here, and they built a little church. I got the group, or the picture of the folks now. And they decided to build a little church. So they went along, building the church, and they had a nice group. On Sunday they just praised the Lord, and then some of the folks come up from Phoenix and be with them. And it was Elder Hamilton and his wife. His wife was a heavy lady. And she could sing. She could sing, and he would preach. And that was in ‘42, when they built that little house, because I saw it on that thing. In ‘46, they were still doing good. But they still had the same little old board thing, building. And I came in ‘46, and I worshipped there with them. And I was working with the young people. So after that, he left. He gave up the church in ‘48. He gave up the church and he went to Blythe, California. Now, another preacher came, and he stayed here for a while, and he left. All right, now I got a little experience now. I got from ‘46 up until -mighta been ‘50. Now, this man, he decided to leave, and he left. That left the church vacant for a while, but the bishop from Phoenix, he sent another pastor here. My brother’s still here. But what happened to me, soon as they sent him here, I went to Holbrook, and I preached out of the church in Holbrook. 
Maxwell: So you were a preacher then, by that time. 
Flemons: Yes. So they was going to put me here, but me and my brother, we look so much alike, they was going to put me here. And so what he did, I went to Phoenix, my brother went to Phoenix. And so he pointed to my brother and said, "Come here." He said, "They want you to pastor that church." And he said, "Who? Me?!" He said, "Yes, don’t you want the church? They want you." He laughed and said, "No, not me. I don’t want it." They in turn then sent another preacher. And I saw him, the bishop, I got back here. "How come you tell Bishop you don’t want us?" And I say, "Okay. Bishop, that wasn’t me you were talking to." He said, "Who was it?" "It was Lewis." And he said, "I thought you were saying that you didn’t want the church." I said, "Not me Bishop, because I’ve been (unclear)." And so he said, "Well, it’s too late now. I done sent another preacher there." So I’m in Holbrook, and I’m doing pretty good down there. And now, this other preacher that he sent, he left, he quit. And now they want me to come back to Flagstaff again. But my brother’s still here. He’s preaching now. See, he’s preaching at this point. And so (unclear) "We want him. We don’t want Raymond, we want Lewis." And I said, "Well, okay." Then the bishop come back, he said, "No, we want you. I want you." And I said, "Well, whatever you say, Bishop." And it was just tossing this way and that way. "No, we want Lewis." And so we met up down there, and Bishop called me back in the office with two more preachers. And he said, "Now, I want you to tell me, do you want that church, or do we have to give it to somebody else?" I said, "Bishop, my brother, he’s been there helping with them all the while I’ve been in Holbrook, and they want him. No, I don’t want it." And so he said, "Well, if you don’t want it, we don’t have to give it to him. But if you want it, we’ll give it to you." I got to think now. If I take it, I’m going to have to go through a lot, because they don’t want me. And [I told] Bishop, "Well, just do what you want to do," and I walked out. And when I got back in the general assembly, and he made the announcement, and said, "Well, we’re making some appointments. We want Pastor Flemons to go to Flagstaff, and then we have to do something about Holbrook later. And he went on, calling all them all. I understand everybody was hurt. So then I come back here and didn’t hardly know what to do. A lot of my relatives was here, see. And I said, "Now, what am I going to do? All them folk. I started preaching when all of them was here." And so I said, "Well, y’all heard that the bishop appointed me to this church, and I come here to work with you. I ain’t going to make no changes -nothing. But they really couldn’t understand it that way. I said, "Well, that’s just the way it’s going to work." And I’ve been here ever since. 
Maxwell: It seems like they’re happy with you now. 
Flemons: Oh, yes. I mean, down through the years.... Let me see, this come down and we put in pews, we put in the organ, piano, these fans. We just put a whole lot of things down. You’ve been down in our kitchen? 
Maxwell: Yes. 
Flemons: We’ve got a lot of things that folks don’t usually have in their kitchen, in their dining room. Most of the stuff, folks gave it to me. Out here at NAU, they give me all them chairs down there. I mean, they just.... The cookers, the deep fryers, they gave that to me. (unclear) Folks (unclear) amazing, when I walk in the place, and I said, "Look, I want this." "How much will you give me for it, Pastor Flemons?" I say, "Oh, I’ll give you ten dollars for it," and it’d be worth a hundred dollars. They’d look at me, "What?! Ten dollars?! That thing’s worth a hundred dollars! That’s all right, go ahead and take it." Don’t you know I know that’s God, it ain’t me. And they just wouldn’t work. 
Maxwell: Well, you were in Holbrook for eighteen years, though, weren’t you? 
Flemons: I was in Holbrook eighteen years. 
Maxwell: That’s a long time. What did your brother do? Your brother was preaching here, and the bishop brought you here. What did your brother do? Did he keep preaching here too? 
Flemons: No, they sent him to Holbrook. See, they made a switch. And by me being superintendent -I was superintendent before they sent me up here, and so they feel like I ought to be here, because I’m always going. I go and take care of all the churches. And so that’s why I’m here. 
Maxwell: It’s more central? 
Flemons: Yes, uh-huh. 
Maxwell: What’s your brother’s first name? 
Flemons: Lewis. 
Maxwell: I thought you said Lewis, I wasn’t sure. You have a lot of relatives here in town, though, right? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: How many of your brothers and sisters came here? 
Flemons: Right now I only have just one brother. 
Maxwell: Just one brother here? 
Flemons: Yes, and one in Winslow. Just two brothers. All the rest of them have passed. 
Maxwell: But they were here before? 
Flemons: No. 
Maxwell: Is there a different Flemons family here? 
Flemons: Okay, here’s what we got: we got relatives like the Wallaces. All the Wallaces, they got a few of them, childrens and all that. And also we got the Whitakers -they’re in the family. And just my brother and me, we’re the oldest ones here. 
Maxwell: A large family. That’s like what Sister Thompson was saying, that about 90 or 95 percent of the people in this fellowship are related one way or another. 
Flemons: Yes, that’s it. 
Maxwell: That’s amazing. When the church started up here, way back, when it started up here in the beginning, when it was in the little building, and you were coming and working with the youth, can you kind of describe the role of the church? I mean, what did the church do in those days in people’s lives? You said there was a youth group. What did you do? 
Flemons: Well, what they did, most like folks do now. They come in and they have church. The main goal was to have an outreach to the folks, to get them to come in to the Lord. Come and unite theirself to God. And also bring the children, so they could be trained up in the way of the Lord. That was the goal. And if that child is trained up in the church, and have the commandments of God down in his heart, he won’t be so easily persuaded by the devil to go out there and take a rock and knock somebody’s window out of their car. See, we want to learn the right way. You have a feeling down in you, because I feel that the word of God itself, will actually constrain us. The word of God by itself, it has power. And since it has power, it’ll catch ahold to us and shake us. I mean, ain’t no use doubting about it, fooling about it, because the word of God is powerful. When his words go out, it will not come back void. Maybe I might say something to somebody, I’ll be here in the church, and some of the young people come by, the drug addicts, and all these alcoholics. They come by, they’re going to stop by, nobody’s going to talk. They’ll go in and talk with Reverend Flemons. And when they get in here and I start to talking to them about the Lord, they might not say, "Yes," but when I get to talking about the Lord, it’s something about them, that the word of God drills something in their heart. I’ve talked with the young men coming in here, and young women, and I get to talking, they’ll start crying and going on, "I want you to pray for me." And I’ll finish praying for them, they wipe their eyes, and they go out. They don’t come back next Sunday, but the word of God is there. It might be a few years later, they’re going to come back and say, "I never will forget the time that Reverend Flemons prayed for me." And they’ll say, "I know what it’s all about." And (unclear) that whatever you do, just do it sincere from your heart, and God’ll fix it. I went to Sacramento, I got a brother up there, and he got burned. I don’t know, something about like a third-degree burn, and they just about drug him out of the house right at the door. He got to the door, he already had one of his legs taken off. So that’s why he couldn’t get out. So they took him in there, and so they called us. Me and my brother went up to see him, and I walked in there, and his daughter said.... His eyes were all closed up, and burns all over his head. She say, "I told him that you was coming." She say, but I don’t know what.... He can’t talk, and I don’t know whether he heard me or not, because he was just almost into a coma. And I walked in there, and I said, "Archie. Hey, boy, what you doing here? You can’t get away from us. You can’t get away from me (unclear) talk." I know he couldn’t talk. And his daughter was standing right aside of his head, "Uncle, do you think he hear me?" I said, "I don’t know, but I think he do." See, because when you’re in a coma like that, sometimes you hear something. Folks can hear you, but you can’t hear them. And (unclear), "We come here to pray for you." And my brother, he’s up there with me, and we all said a prayer. I got over there close to him, I touched him, "Okay, we’re going to start praying." And I went on (unclear) I prayed, and then got through praying. I set there talking to him. "Uncle, do you think he hear you?" I said, "God hears me, anyway." I kept on talking to him. And so he ain’t said nothing. So then he was there a couple of days, and he started kinda mending. So we left and come on back home. And so the Lord lifted him up. And so when he got well a couple of years later, he came down here and I said, "Boy, let me tell you, we was up there really praying for you. I don’t know what you was doing. What was you thinking about?" And he laughed. I’ll tell you, he called me off a right one, too, with all his brother. He said, "I’m going to tell you what. I know when you come in there." I said, "Yes?" He said, "Uncle Lewis, he came in there too. He just said a few words, but you come in there, you come in there like you were going to run that devil outta there." I said, "I wanted you to get well." He said, "I heard everything (unclear), and then you went out, and then you come back again. And Uncle Lewis went out and come again, but he didn’t say but two or three words." And so these are some of the things that I feel if we talk to God, sincerely, God will penetrate his word into us. And that’s my fully belief. Some folks might not believe that, but if we talk to God and tell God that our brothers, our sisters is in trouble, we want you to go in and touch their heart, and even heal that body, we definitely believe in God’s healing. And that’s one of the key notes, but you gotta have faith in God. And that’s the reason the church is trying to draw the young people together, so when they decide to go out there and do things different from what their parents is saying, they know they’re wrong. And then that thing can come on so strong, and then they start crying, "I know I’m wrong." And we had some strong teachers here during that time, too. We had a lady who was here, who was Ollie May Lloyd [phonetic]. We all called her Mother Lloyd. 
Maxwell: Oh, Arthur Lloyd’s mom? 
Flemons: Yes. And she was a strong believer. Folk would come in they would, "(unclear) I want you to pray for me. I’m having trouble out of my kids, and have trouble out of this." And she’d say, "C’mon, honey, let’s pray." And God would work in that woman, through [them force?]. And so that’s what the early church -and you’re still here. 
Maxwell: What kinds of activities did they have in the church? 
Flemons: Activities they had was they had whatchacall prayer Bible man, and then they had a mission. They go out and visit the sick and pray for them. If there’s any need, they would distribute to the needy. YPWW children, they work with them here at Sunday school, and on the weekends they all meet down here. They have some kind of gathering so they learn how to cope with the folks when they go outside. All right. See, a lot of them that didn’t have that exposure, when they go out to school, then they wouldn’t know what to do. They just holler and cry because they haven’t had the exposure with children. But a lot of times children can be just as bad as they want to at home, but when they go outside to meet somebody else, it’s a different story. Because we have some here, I mean real smart, at home, and they get up there and do all that. And we ask them, "Okay, we’re going to put you up here to say a little Easter speech." "Waaa," they start crying. Take them back home, they say it just like that. But the more we expose them here, and then they know how to do when they go outside. And we have other activities like picnics. Kids like to go out, and in a picnic they have whatchacall -I don’t know, they don’t have too much of it now. I be gone so much. But they have what’s called the wiener roast. They got them little wieners and little sausage and put them over the fire, all the kids out there cooking their own meal. So these are some of the things the children like to do. And the church is a place that’ll help everybody, even the older people. You can go out and visit old people. I tell ya’, I’m getting old myself. Older people, they set there at home, and I say, "You going to church Sunday?" "Oh, I don’t know." I’ll call them, "You coming to church?" "Oh, no, not this time." But you go around and talk, "Hey, I come by to pick you up for church. I’ll be by tomorrow to pick you up for church. Yes, yes, I don’t want to hear none of that. Yes, yes, c’mon, I want to pick you up for church." "Well, I’ll see." "Okay, you all ready (unclear)." And then you get on the phone in the morning, "Okay, I’m on my way to pick you up. You already dressed?" "Almost." You know? But [his health?], that’s what the church is for, what I think, to help folks spiritually and physically and naturally. So this is one of the things. 
Maxwell: Did you have many older folks back then in the early days of the church? 
Flemons: It was quite a few. It was more then, back there, than it is now, because most of the older folks that come up to a certain age, they done passed on. And now the ones that’s left, like me, and a few more of us, there’s not that many. But the younger peoples, that’s what we got to really focus on, the younger peoples, and keep them in line, so they can actually follow the footsteps of the Bible. If you let them slide to the side, and they’re going to have their own way, I just don’t believe we should let the kids just have their way. The children’s is hard to deal with. They’re definitely hard to deal with, because we was brought up in the same way, and sometimes maybe our parents kind of went overboard a little bit, because he pulled his belt in his rage, and he got you on the floor there, and he’s just got on there, and you know, give you a good whipping. And then you (gasp), "My daddy mistreating me." Okay, now you grow up, and you say, "I ain’t going to treat my kids that way. I’m going to let my kids decide what they want to do." Yes, you got to wait until you get (unclear) learn what to do first. If he don’t know what to do, how is he going to decide what to do? So you start off, and he just kind of walk and roll down and fall. "Oh, my baby, ta, ta, ta." Okay. Then he get up a little larger, he come there, "I want you to get in there and sit down." "I ain’t going to sit down, Mama." "You set down, boy." The boy turn around and he slap you. And you say, "Oh, he’s just a baby." Let him just keep a-doing it. After a while, he’ll decide he’s going to do something different. It’s something about children got to be trained up to a certain age. Now, we knew this in the Bible because Jesus was twelve years old when he went to, you know. But if he went up to twelve, if we took care of that child and trained him up until he’s twelve years old, then that will be a good age bracket. Okay, if we did that, because you have bent him and you have shaped him from the time of birth up until twelve years old. And then he going to still be there with you until he gets sixteen or seventeen, and he’s going to remember he can’t do that. Long as he’s with you, he can’t do that. But now, you let him have a change, sixteen, seventeen, eighteen years old, and most of the time children that are trained over like that, you know what they do? They would say, "No, my mama and daddy they didn’t let me do this." "Come on, go with us!" "No, let me call home. And let me tell my mother and dad where I’m going. I’m going to ask them would this be all right." If they’re trained to do it.... I mean, somebody you got to follow. But if he’s not.... Oh, my child, I been here thirty-one years. "Is your child coming to church? I’ll come and pick him up." "Johnny, do you want to go to church Sunday?" "No, Mama." "Pastor’s going to pick you up." "No, Mama, I don’t want to go." "Johnny say he don’t want to go." Five years old! This is what I’m saying about training a child. Not five years old, he’s still in training. At five, six, seven, eight, he’s still in training. He ought to be chastened a little bit. He ought to be stand up in a corner. You know, since the law say don’t spank him, don’t get your belt off and beat him like my daddy beat me. I mean, he didn’t kill me. He didn’t. It made me think. Every time I go to start to do something, and I think, "Uh-oh, if Papa find out, ooo! I’m going to be in trouble!" (unclear) Mama ain’t going to let him do it. It’s things that we got to really think about in the children. So that’s why I’m glad for this church, because my son, he was brought up in this church. He was brought up, and he’s fifty-some years old now, and when he comes to talk, he says, "My dad, he’s this, and (unclear) very much." Say, "If you do something, don’t worry, he’ll find it out." He don’t know how I find things out, "But," he say, "he found it out." And then he said, "I want to talk with you." 
[END TAPE 2, SIDE B; BEGIN TAPE 3, SIDE A] 
Maxwell: [It’s May 29], 2002. This is Reverend Raymond Flemons, we’re at 419 South Verde at the Church of Christ in God, in Flagstaff, Arizona. I’m Carol Maxwell. This is the African-American Pioneers in Flagstaff, the third tape. You were telling me that an important aspect of the role of the church was to shape the children, and that was an important purpose of the church way back in its beginning too (
Flemons: Yes.) and that you had different activities: you had a mission branch that reached out to the poor, and people who were in need for one reason or another; and then another branch that was involved in training the youth; and then you had activities like picnics for the kids. Were there other activities and other things going on in the church back then that you can recall? 
Flemons: Well, that’s mostly what they had. Some of the activities, they didn’t -back there they didn’t really go for, such as recreation, of dancing, go out, and all this here, and partying. They just didn’t go for that. If we’re going to have something for the children, it ought to be something like to be controlled with a clean sports or whatever the case might be. We once, in this time, we had what you call a teenage club. And they could go to the teenage club and dance and whatever the case might be, but they didn’t want no adults in. And we said that was fine. I’m going to use my son for an example. He was twelve years old, and he said, "Papa, I want to go to the teenage club at night." And I said, "No, you can’t go now. You’re not old enough. That’s a teenage club." Because he was going to put the one and two together, you know, he (unclear) know he’s up there. And so then when he got thirteen, he knew he was going then. He said, "Papa, I want to go to the teenage club. I’m thirteen. (unclear) thirteen." I said, "Yes, but you got to understand, when you say teenagers, you just in the beginning. And when you get there, it might not be like you think it should be, and they going to be pushing you aside because a lot of them is a lot older than you. I think if you wait until you were sixteen...." But he couldn’t really understand that. But I wouldn’t let him go out at night, talk about going to a teenage club. And come to find out, they were doing a lot of things then, because they didn’t have enough adult people there to check what they were doing. And during that time, beer was the popular thing that they were using. And everybody give a little beer, you know, whatever the case might be. And so I say we come to the church. So if we would use for the young people, we would love to take them out on a picnic, where they play certain balls and exercise theirselves. But there’s some of the things that we just didn’t approve of. Not whether there was so much wrong in it, or right, but the church just didn’t approve it. 
Maxwell: The teenage club, was that for the black community only, or was that for the whole of Flagstaff? 
Flemons: No, it was just on the South Side, in that we had the blacks and the Spanish and Indians. All of them could go to that teenage club, but it wasn’t very large. And so they just set that up for the teenagers on the South Side. 
Maxwell: Who ran that? Do you know who set it up? 
Flemons: No, I sure don’t. 
Maxwell: I wanted to ask you to say your wife’s name, her maiden name -your current wife of fifty years, right? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: What was her name before you married her? 
Flemons: Mamie Westbrook. 
Maxwell: And your son’s name? 
Flemons: Charles Henry Flemons. 
Maxwell: Your wife was here with her aunt? Was she living with her aunt? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: And what was her aunt’s name? 
Flemons: Lee. Gladys Lee, I think. 
Maxwell: Is that family still here, do you know? 
Flemons: No, they done passed on. 
Maxwell: So she doesn’t have grandchildren or something here still? 
Flemons: Yes, they’re in Las Vegas. 
Maxwell: Are they related to the Watkins at all? 
Flemons: No. 
Maxwell: Okay. I know that Ms. Watkin’s daughters are in Las Vegas. I thought there might be a connection. So she was a Westbrook then? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: Was the rest of her family here, her parents and all, or not? 
Flemons: They stayed here for a while. Her mother, Molly Westbrook, and her father was Henry Westbrook, and they moved to Las Vegas, and they both passed. 
Maxwell: But they weren’t born and raised in Flagstaff? 
Flemons: No, no, in Arkansas -Little Rock, Arkansas. 
Maxwell: Just for the sake of history, do you recall or know where your parents were born? 
Flemons: San Augustine, Texas. 
Maxwell: Oh, really? Both of them? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: So you’re a Texan from way back. I just kinda wanted to make sure we had the (unclear) kind of family described there. You said there were other kinds of activities that people engaged in. You said you would go to church, but other people would be having a crap game under the bridge, or playing cards under the trees or something in those days? 
Flemons: No. During that time, we didn’t play cards, and a lot of folks just get out and just roll dice for sport. Our church was really strict and concerned about these things. Cards, you know how you get out of them. Either you playing cards, they have a little game, you know -that’s poker and whatever. It’s fun. They say this. Now you’re just doing it, there’s no money involved, but they say this were the devil’s working tools. Now, this is what they said. because once you start playing cards or rolling dice or these things, and once you learn and you think you’re real good, the folk can persuade into "let’s go gamble for money." And on the other hand, if we used folks that are drinking, and if they start drinking beer, you know, beer ain’t too much. And you (unclear) and now you want something a little stronger. And the Bible say that wine is immoral, and he that drinks it is not wise, because he can be deceived. If anybody usually drink wine, you start off, oh, that wine tastes good-I mean, it’s sweet. It ain’t no bad something there. And you just keep on drinking it, and after a while, you say, "Hey!" All of a sudden, you’re drunk. So we got to be careful that it’d lead into something. Now, my son, he was telling me about marijuana. I don’t know nothing about that stuff, I don’t know about it, but he was telling me, "Pop, everybody’s smoking marijuana. It just makes you feel high, and then after that, you’re okay. And then I said, "What do they say when it’s not strong enough, marijuana’s not strong enough, what do they do?" He said, "Yes, they go to something a little bit stronger." "And then it ain’t strong enough, what do they do?" "They go a little bit stronger." And then you get hooked on the things, and you just can’t get away from them real easy. I said, "Don’t start on marijuana, and you don’t have to worry about the cocaine. You don’t have to worry about nobody getting a little stronger, and you don’t have to fight it." So I feel that we should have basic things that we use. If we’re going to use wine, like they did in the old Bible, and it said, "Don’t touch that wine when it starts moving itself in the cup." Y’all hear me out there? See that wine start to moving itself in the cup. And I said, "Lord, what it mean by ‘moving itself’?" because I didn’t know much about wine. Then I looked in the corner of my daddy’s house, and he was brewing this corn whiskey. And then he said, "No, it ain’t right yet. Wait until it start’s to boiling" (glug, glug, glug) You know what I’m saying? It started to moving itself around in the cup. It’s getting strong, the alcohol is building up in it. So this is what we got to be careful of, the little things we start can grow into big things. And once our children know that, it would help them along the line. 
Maxwell: When was that, when your son was telling you about marijuana, do you remember? In the fifties or the sixties? Do you remember when that was? 
Flemons: That was mostly in the sixties. Let’s see, how old was that boy? He’s fifty years old. 
Maxwell: Let’s see, he was walking in ‘52 when you were building the house, so he must have been born about ‘51, I’d say. 
Flemons: It must have been the seventies. Yes, because that’s when he graduated out of high school, in the seventies. Yes. And so that way he just kind of had to try it a little bit. And so I said, "No way. Don’t tell me about that." And so I learned one thing from him, that if we teach our children the things that are wrong, that’s not going to stop them from doing it, but whenever they do it, they have a guilty conscience. And then after they grow up, you know, you back away from it. He’s got two boys going to college here in Flagstaff. One Esteban and one Dominque. So he tried to use the same [technique] on them as I used on him. And he said, "Well, look...." He already referred back to, and I’m glad I was able to help him. He said, "My dad said this." He was talking to them and said, "Look, the world don’t owe you nothing. You’re going to have to work for what you get. And now you get up and get out there and do what you want to, and they catch ya’, and they’re going to put you in jail. And I ain’t going to go up there and getcha. I’m not going up there (unclear) they put ya’ in jail." Knowing, too, he was going to go up there and say the same thing. But I know if my son went up there and get in jail, I want to know why did you put him in jail for. You know. But once he have that in mind, that furthermore he ain’t going to like it. So that’s the way his children is brought up. If you see them, you wouldn’t think they was my boy’s sons, because he’s tough when he wanna. (chuckles) But they are real nice. Did you ever meet them? They’re real nice. 
Maxwell: What does your son do? Did he go to college? 
Flemons: Yes. He finished high school here, and he went to Phoenix, and I think he put two or three years in college. So that last year, I don’t think he did too good, because he got married down there. And so when he came back up here, she was going to work while he go to college. And so she was down there working, he was up here going to school. But he didn’t pass them grades (unclear) so he just stopped. And he said, "Pop, I know I can make it." So he went and got him a job down here at the airport, skycap. He started off selling computers and calculators. He’s a pretty intelligent kid. And so now he got his home, and then he got another one. The one that he moved out, his boys, when they come back, they stay in that. What I’m trying to say, he made it because he wanted to. If he had of finished college, I don’t believe he would have did no more than what he’s doing now. But, he found out one thing, if you don’t have that piece of paper, they’ll slap you in the face every time. because he’s had some good jobs offered to him, and he didn’t get them because he didn’t have that paper. 
Maxwell: I want to take you back a little bit, thinking about the church here. You were telling me that the big emphasis of the church was training the children up in the beginning. I meant to ask you, how might that have changed the role of the church in this community over time? Has that been the role of this church, all the way through, from beginning to now? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: Has it changed or gotten bigger or gotten smaller over time -the role of the church and what it was doing? 
Flemons: It seems like it got smaller. Well, in fact, it has, because years ago, when I first come to this church, we had children that come in, and we had folk was glad to teach them. And didn’t have to worry about your children because if you left your child here with us, there’s always going to be somebody here to take care of that child, and make sure that child gets back home. And no matter how that child says, "Oh, I can walk home, I live across the street," you ain’t walking across the street. So they was more concerned about them and more strict. And folks didn’t mind sending their kids. But you did have some of the same problems as we have now. Well, I don’t want nobody whipping on my kid, nobody beating on any kid, but they just have to discipline your kid, and make them do that right. And he don’t wanna go back. We used to have every year -we still have it -vacation Bible school. Folks send their children to the vacation Bible school. And so there was one little boy, he didn’t want to come. His mama said, "Well, if he don’t want to go, he don’t have to." So she brang him here and he got mad. "I want to go home! I want to go home!" (blank tape for a second) ... what they want. "They won’t let me come home, Mama!" Okay. So I said, "Well, let him stay here." (unclear) "Well, you can stay here." By the time we get halfway through vacation Bible school lesson, his mother has to bring him. "Mama, I want to go!" It’s something about children that you got to know how to deal with them, and you can??t make them do it, but you got to do something that they can be interested enough in to want to go. 
Maxwell: So you’re not finding the parents are supporting it, or is it that there aren’t enough adults here to do (unclear). 
Flemons: They are not supporting it like they used to. That’s all I can see right now. It might be some other reason. See, parents now, I guess maybe they’re working more, and they’re sending their kids to the day care, or next door, "keep my kids." But I don’t know, we just don’t have them like we used to. 
Maxwell: I wanted to ask you if you could tell us the story of how you became a reverend and a pastor. 
Flemons: Well, I’ll have to go way back. 
Maxwell: That’s okay. 
Flemons: Now, my parents was Christian people. My mother was a missionary, and she worked not only in the church, but in the community, because she was concerned about people, and also she was concerned about the children. She felt that if she could get that young lady or young man, interested enough in serving the Lord, that he could train the children up in the way [the Lord will help them to go?]. And so I found out that if we start at the root, you won’t have all that trouble to kind of bag down and do all that. And so my mama -I call her Mama all the time -my mama being so sincere and so concerned about folks out there in the world, we call it, and can’t hardly get them to church, they come down the street, staggering and drunk and falling on the ground, on the sidewalk. And so she said, "Well, this person, we’re definitely going to have to pray for them. And we got to read the Bible to them." And she set down and read the Bible to me. In my spare time, she’s setting there, and she just read the Bible, and that was a lot of encouragement to me. Even before I went in the service, the Lord had blessed me. And I had that urge that I wanted to do something for the Lord. And these scriptures come: "He that desire the office of a bishop desire a good work." See, because I find out that if you didn’t want to do it, God wasn’t going to make you do it. So if you want to do it, then God will help you if you have that desire. And even through the service, before I went in the service, I worked there at the local church with the young people. And then when I went overseas, I had the urge, but sometimes you want to draw back. After I went overseas, and I met a few young men, God would not let that little fire burning go out. And whenever somebody said "we want to read the Bible," or "we want to do this here," I was right there. We had a little mission over there, even in the service. And I was right there. Insomuch (unclear) not what I’m doing, but I was there in the service, sitting there reading my Bible, and here comes somebody up there saying, "Reverend, I’m having trouble back home. Would you just pray for me?" And at the time, I think I’m needing prayer myself. But the Lord just give me the strength. In a way, he’s saying to me, "I’m not going to let that light go out." All the way through service, until I got back home, before I really acknowledged, and I seed that the Lord really wanted me to do this, I said, "Lord I can’t do, Lord I don’t know how." (unclear) time, he settled me to go into the scripture and the studying of his word. And when I got here, that’s when I got my anointing, in Flagstaff. And that’s it. 
Maxwell: How did you learn that if you didn’t want to, God wasn’t going to make you? You said that you found out that if you didn’t want to, God wasn’t going to make you. 
Flemons: All right. Now, we find in the scripture, God will give you the desires of your heart. Now, if you don’t want it, he’s not going to give it to you. Now, sometimes folks say, "The Lord made me do this." Sometimes God will put pressure on us, and let us know that the vow you made back there, the things I want you to do, I want you to do it now. But he’s not going to just grab us and just say, "Hey, you’re going to do this." 
Maxwell: What was your anointing? What does that mean? 
Flemons: The spirit of God that dwell in you more regular and stronger. Sometime the Lord just speak to me at night. You know, sometimes folks have a dream. A dream to me was one thing, but when God is really speaking to you with his spirit, it goes beyond a dream. My mother used to say all the time, "Well, boy, you ate too much, you’re going to have a dream." No. Sometimes the Lord just reveals things to you walking along the street. And he was showing me the things that he wanted me to do. I’m not just preaching (unclear). In that vision I could just see him plainly, and (unclear). And then, in certain points, he would stop me and show me that there is trials and tribulations going to come your way. And Jesus suffered. Now we’re going to have to suffer. He did suffer in the flesh and cease from sin. So we’re going to have to suffer in this flesh. (pause) Praise God. 
Maxwell: You had a pretty strong spiritual experience when you were a kid, though, too, didn’t you? 
Flemons: Yes. Similar, because my mother, like I said before, was a praying woman, and she always read the Bible and whatever. And I was just so close to her. And in a lot of things that I had in mind I wanted to do, I just feel like it was because of her, because she just look around and see things that was going on. She’d say, "I don’t know what we’re going to do with this generation." And I’m trying to figure out what generation? And those things like that. One thing Mama did, she got on her knees and prayed. I guess we can stand up and pray too. We might get the same result. But when I get down and pray, I can feel the anointing and the shower of the [heart?]. And that’s one of the main things, because when I was fourteen, I think it was fourteen, the Lord come in and he spoke to me. And the spirit of the Lord and the anointing of the Lord was upon me for a week. Some folks may not believe in speaking in tongues is anything. But when I went to service that Sunday, and the Lord blessed me, and he filled me with the Holy Spirit, and I come off speaking in tongues. And I spoke in tongues, and spoke in tongues. Every time I come to church, as soon as I walk in the house of the Lord, the anointing of the Lord [come on in?]. And they said, "You want to testify?" I just started speaking in tongues. And I said, "Lord, I want to testify, I want to do something. Nobody here (unclear) understand me." (mumbles) And then I guess it must have been a week or so before the Lord really let me down. And then after he let me down, the first thing I went into the Bible and I started to reading the Bible and trying to find all the scriptures, so I can tell somebody something, you know. And that was a mystery to me. 
Maxwell: That whole experience? 
Flemons: (unclear) 
Maxwell: (unclear) Thompson asked me to ask you a question. She told me there was something I could ask you about. Do you have time before you need to eat? 
Flemons: Go ahead. 
Maxwell: Okay. Could you talk about the church’s role with helping travelers and strangers who pass through? 
Flemons: Yes. Since I’ve been here in Flagstaff, this place is right on the highway. And the track is over there, and a lot of travelers come through. Some is hungry, and some is just riding, you know, get through, cars break down. I really don’t understand it too well, how they find me. And they get in town, they start to looking, "Where is Reverend Flemons’ church?" "What? How’d you find me?" "Well, somebody told me you was over here." I said, "How many more churches you stop at?" "Well, we ain’t stopped at nobody." And I did that, I’d take folks down to.... They come in, and they’re hungry. And I guess one time I mighta been too [zealous?] about certain things, because I feel like if a person is traveling and needs some help, the Lord will give them some help. And if he says he’s hungry, I feel like he’s hungry. But I find out later, all the time they’re not. But I would say, "Okay, we don’t have no money to give you, but come on, go down to Jack-in-the-Box," Bob’s Big Boy was here. I’d take them down there, set them down in there. "How many hamburgers can you eat?" And sometimes they’d say, "Well, give me two." I said, "Yes, you can take one on the way with you, if you don’t want to eat it all." And the Lord laid it on this man’s heart at the Food Bank -I’m trying to think of his name. But anyway, his name was Arthur Miller, he’s a gentleman. And he came by, he was in Bible class with us one night, and he was talking, he said, "Reverend Flemons, I hear y’all...." 
[END TAPE 3, SIDE A; BEGIN SIDE B] 
Flemons: "... been talking about all them folks you been feeding and coming to here. Why don’t you come on and help me out in the Food Bank, and set up a kitchen down here in the basement?" I said, "Okay!" And I fed folks by the hundreds. They come through here just one. And then Thanksgiving, me and him get together and he give me -well, one year we had sixty turkeys down here, and we gave away sixty turkeys to the folks here in the community. Not just the church, per se, but the people. They come and say.... And one nice thing about it, they give us these here smoked turkeys. They taste pretty good! (laughter) They give us quite a few of those smoked turkeys, and then all the rest just regular turkeys. Altogether we had about sixty. And the folks come down, they want a turkey, and we give them a turkey. Every year, a turkey. And so one lady, she had a smoked turkey, and she went by this lady’s house and said, "What kind of turkey you got?" "Oh, smoked turkey." "Reverend Flemons got? Oh, I’m going down and get me a smoked turkey." You know. So she come down. And I say, "Honey, I want to tell you, we can’t just give you a smoked turkey." (unclear) "I want a smoked turkey." And I looked around and I said, "Give her a smoked turkey." So, you know, sometimes folks just do things to aggravate you outside. So I give her a smoked turkey. But that year we gave out about sixty turkeys. The folks was glad to receive those turkeys. But in spite of all, you have somebody in there, does not appreciate that this is a gift. But when they got it, they were glad for it. I probably would still be doing that, but I done got so old, I can’t walk up and down them stairways. But I want to say this, if somebody give us something, this is what we should be -we should be thankful of it. because whether they???re giving this away, it’s not the T-bone steaks, it’s not the pork chops, it’s not the best fine meats that is on the market, but they’re giving this stuff to us to help us survive. And if you got a little money, got get us a piece of steak. But you come down there and you get mad because I ain’t got no steak to give you, and you won’t come back to get nothing, you could run into a problem. "Child, I can’t stand that (unclear) Flemons got in there. And you know where it come from? Them folks down there had all that stuff and they just give it away because they couldn’t use it." I say, "If I could use it, I wouldn’t give it to you." But the point is, this is a side dish to help you, because a lot of times I go for months at a time and don’t eat no pork chop, I don’t eat no steak. Them vegetables and fruit is better for you and for your health than a lot of that meat. And that’s where a lot of us run into problems. And even trying to help folks find jobs. They come by, and they want a job, and I say, "Well, I’ll see what I can do." I take them downtown. Now, I always tell the man, "This man here needs some work. He’s proven to me that he’s sincere, he don’t want to go out there and steal. He don’t want to sell drugs. Could you give him some work?" He say, "Yes." I say, "Now, he’s going to be working for you. I’m not going to be here to prove to you that he’s all right. But if he don’t satisfy you, that’s up to you. I did my part." And a lot of people have been hired here in this city because of me. 
Maxwell: People who were in the community to start with and needed work? 
Flemons: In the community, and also those traveling through. 
Maxwell: How do you think the travelers even know your name to look for you? 
Flemons: I feel that the Lord put me here. And when they come into town, the first question they ask, "Where are the churches?" And they meet [the board?], they’re going to say, "Oh! what you looking for?" "Well, I’m looking for a little help." "Go on down that street. Ask for Reverend Flemons. He’ll help you." And I’m saying, "I don’t know." But I try to be really strict, and I try to treat them nice, because I wouldn’t want anybody to say, "What did you come here for? Here! You oughta be at home! What you doing out on the highway this time? I can’t understand it. You ain’t got no money when you stay at home." Maybe you’re going somewhere, trying to find a job where he can make some money. You don’t know you’re going to have a break-down before you leave home. If you did, you wouldn’t leave. But some of them do leave home without any money. And when they get here, they want some, and they’re in need. And then some of them, they don’t. They fool me many a time. They’ll fool me, and the devil told me, "Don’t help none of them folks. They ain’t nothing but swindlers." They fooled me a lot of times. But the Lord didn’t say [to] stop because one.... And I’m going to tell this, and maybe somebody know this. This man -I mean, I guess I’m just so famous that he stopped and found out we would do this here. He got on the phone, and he called my home, must have been about eight, nine o’clock in the evening. "We just got in town. And me and my wife and two children. We needed a little money to go on, because we’re on our way to Las Vegas. Just as much as you can give us, we’ll go as far as we can." I said, "Well, I really don’t know." I’m at home, and he’s (unclear) at a telephone booth. And I said, "I don’t know. I’m at the house here, and I’m fixing to eat my supper and everything. Could you wait until the morning?" He said, "Well, I guess I could, but my wife and family is out here in the cold and everything, and we just got a little money. We can get us a hotel and we can go on in the morning early." I said, "I don’t know. Where you from?" This is a good one. He said, "I’m from Mississippi." I said, "Yes?" He said, "My parents told me to call you. He met you in Memphis, Tennessee." (unclear) every year, all them thousands of people. I don’t know who I’m talking to. And he said, "He know you. You Reverend Flemons." I said, "Yes." He said, "He told me to tell you if you let me have the money, he would send it back to you." And I said, "Well, okay. Where are you? Let me come over and see you." When I got over there and looked at that guy -I mean, the Lord just showed me this is a swindler. He’s at the phone booth. When the other guy called, that didn’t sound like no long distance call from Mississippi, say, "Will you let So-and-So have this money, and then I’ll take care of it." Oh, then I seen both (unclear) setting in the car. I didn’t see no woman in the car, didn’t see no kids in the car. I said, "Look, I ain’t got no money for you guys. You gotta come straight to me, and talk to me like a man, instead of playing games. I’m not going to let you have nothing." I just got in my car and drove off. Just the name. He almost got me. He almost got me. But if the Lord hadn’t of just stepped right in, I don’t know. So these are a lot of things I’ve experienced here in Flagstaff, and I’m yet trying to help people. That’s not going to stop me from trying to help people. 
Maxwell: I wanted to ask you about the relationship between the different churches here. I’m aware that you might need to eat now. Are you okay to talk to me about the relationship between the churches here, like why there’s one that block, and one this block, and one the block up. Are you able to do that, or do you want to stop a second? 
Flemons: Yes. (tape turned off and on) 
Maxwell: Can you talk about the relationship between the churches? 
Flemons: We have four black churches: A Methodist church, and First Baptist Church, and Spring Hill Baptist Church. And we have Church of God in Christ, which is Riverside Church. Between the pastors, we have good fellowship and no different.... Although, the Baptist Church, they have a little bit different doctrine from the Church of God in Christ, which is Riverside Church. And Spring Hill Baptist Church, they have almost the same doctrine. From what I can understand, not knowing too much about their doctrine, that they have the same. And Harbor Chapel, they are different. They have different doctrine, but we don’t let that come between us. We yet fellowship with each other. And we all reading out of the same Bible. I find that if we try to take out of the word of God, take away that what God have written, and I feel that the Bible is the inspired word of God, and you cannot go wrong by using the Bible. And we all fellowship together wholeheartedly, and there is no division as far as the church is concerned. That might be somebody that is members of the church might not like certain things that is going on, but as our doctrine is based upon the Bible itself, and we are trying -the pastors here in this city, as far as I know -we’re trying to teach what’s right. We got our young people out on the street, and we’re trying to reach them. And we cannot reach them divided. But we have to be together to reach those young people and help them get jobs, help them whatever they want to do. I don’t know how many of the pastors visit the jails -black pastors visit the jails -but I think most of us would do that, because I find myself running out of time, visiting the jails, when I should be preaching to them to keep them out of jail. See, sometimes we say, "Well...." And they will lay it on our shoulders, say, "Look, my son is in jail. How come you won’t go see him?" I said, "If you had of sent your son to church and I could have preached to him, he might [not] have been in jail." He could have been in prison. I said, "Now, we going to [byputs?] but let’s start and do the first thing first." And we can reach our children, we can do it, if we do it. So that’s one of the things about relationship. And we have a good relationship with the churches here in this city. 
Maxwell: Was it always that way, or was it different in the beginning? 
Flemons: No, ever since I’ve been here, it has been a good relationship. 
Maxwell: So then it sounds like, if I’m understanding you correctly, it sounds like each church has a slightly different doctrine, which may attract a different group of people, and you might have an individual in one church who doesn’t get along with an individual in another, but that the churches as whole organizations all work together, and there are not antagonisms between them. 
Flemons: That’s right. And we’re glad for that in this community. And that way we can reach more people. 
Maxwell: Do the pastors of all the churches meet together, or have lunches together to talk about issues and so on? 
Flemons: Sometimes we do meet together and have a fellowship. But here lately we have ... one, two, three ... our pastors are working. The First Baptist (unclear) pastor. Spring Hill, I think he working too. Harbor Chapel, they don’t have one. And I’m the onliest one that’s too old to work. 
Maxwell: So they work other jobs for money, and then they are also a pastor? 
Flemons: A pastor. Yes, they work on jobs, and then they also pastor their church. But I’m the onliest one that’s too old to work on a job. (laughs) 
Maxwell: So that makes it hard for you guys to get together if they’re working jobs and have families. 
Flemons: Yes. But we’re hoping -at least I’m hoping -that we would go back to where we were once. On a Saturday we could get together and have what you call a black pastoral alliance, and we can set down and talk about the problems and talk about the churches, what we’re going to try to reach, and things that we want to do in the community. And I believe it going to come back to that, although they’re working during the week. We ought to be able to find a place on Saturday, or find a place on Sunday evening that we could set down and talk about the problems of this city, because it definitely need it. 
Maxwell: Do you have any connection with the non-black churches? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: What’s that like? 
Flemons: We cooperate with Spanish, with Canyon Chapel over here, a Spanish church. And also the church up on Fourth Street, clear at the top of the hill. I can’t call his name. And they seem to always kind of get together. We meet over there. They had a breakfast -should be another one coming up real soon. They had a breakfast, and we all visited the breakfast, and it was a nice breakfast that they had. And that way, it give a chance to meet the other different pastors of the different churches. And so I think that’s a very good thing. 
Maxwell: Do you remember way back in the beginning, was there any contact between the black churches and the non-black churches? 
Flemons: No. It wasn’t no struggle, nothing like that. But we just didn’t visit the white churches, and they didn’t visit us. 
Maxwell: Did they not help you or anything when you were building? -the other churches that were here in the city already -they didn’t help out when you went to build? 
Flemons: The churches itself? 
Maxwell: Yes. The other churches didn’t help pitch in and help build it or anything? 
Flemons: They helped some of the black churches. They helped this church down here, Methodist church. 
Maxwell: The Harbor Chapel? 
Flemons: Harbor Chapel -they helped them. 
Maxwell: Yes, I thought there might be either good or bad. 
Flemons: No, it wasn’t no friction, no problems at all. 
Maxwell: But only a little bit of help? 
Flemons: They did quite a bit of help for Harbor Chapel. 
Maxwell: Did they? 
Flemons: Yes, because this church on the hill, it’s.... Can you call that church? 
Maxwell: First Baptist? 
Flemons: No, another one. 
?: A Lutheran church? 
Maxwell: Up on Fourth Street? 
Flemons: Uh-huh. 
Maxwell: Is it Presbyterian? 
Flemons: It’s a Methodist church. 
Maxwell: It’s a Methodist church up there? 
?: Trinity Heights? 
Flemons: Right. 
Maxwell: Is that it? 
Flemons: Yes. 
Maxwell: What kind of church is it? 
Flemons: Trinity Heights. They really come down and help Harbor Chapel. 
Maxwell: Did they? 
Flemons: Yes. But I feel like if we had asked them to come and help us in any way, they woulda. And then there’s a church down here on Lake Mary Road, cooperated with us. And down in Spring Hill and also First Baptist. 
Maxwell: So it sounds like the churches in Flagstaff at least got along well. 
Flemons: Oh yes, yes. We get along real well. 
Maxwell: I know we’re just about out of time, but I wondered if there was anything else you wanted to put on the tape? 
Flemons: Well, I would love to say that in my mind, Flagstaff is growing, and a lot of blacks is coming in, and whites and other peoples is coming into Flagstaff. If we could get together and look at Flagstaff as a whole, if we can see in Flagstaff for not only the blacks need us, or the whites, or Spanish -we all are one. And the Lord is looking at us as one people. And once we get together and understand what God is doing, and the prayers of the righteous prevail us much. Where we’re having troubles and disasters, prayers can reach the problem. I was just thinking the other day that I was here when we had a drought in the city of Flagstaff, and Lake Mary dried up, and all these little pools and things. Now we’re moving back to that same position again. Now, I don’t know whether this is something the Lord is speaking to us, letting us know we’re going to have to come together in a unity of the spirit. Anytime trouble come, mens are more likely to come together to help each other. And soon as it’s over, "Oh well, it’s over now." Let me tell you this little story. This man was telling this little joke, that the water rose, and they was trying to cross the river. And it was three of them there, and one of them said, "Look, I can’t swim." The other one said, "Well, I can’t swim." And he said, "But we going to have to get across the other side." And the other one said, "Why don’t we ask God to help us?" And so he said, "Yes, that’s a good idea." He said, "Lord, here I got a turkey. If you help me across this stream of water, I’m going to give you this turkey." The other one said, "Don’t tell him give him all. Just tell him you’ll give him some of it." He said, "No, hush, man. Lord, if you let me cross this stream of water, I’ll give you this turkey." He said, "Man, don’t tell him that." He said, "Why? I ain’t going to give him none of it when I get across." Sometimes we fail to recognize the vow that we made to God. If we promise God if he will bless us, give us water when we need it, food on our table, and the things that we can enjoy, and when he bless us, remember the vow. So we in Flagstaff going to remember the vow that God has promised to bless us. 
Maxwell: And people listening to this ought to know that this is the driest winter we’ve had on record. So we’re definitely headed into a place where we might be making vows and not really thinking about (unclear). 
Flemons: Yes, "Give us some water, Lord." Because we definitely need it. 
Maxwell: Yes. 
Flemons: And somebody’s going to be saying, "Lord, give us some snow, because I want to go skiing. Lord, give us some more water in the lake, because I want to go fishing. Lord, give us some water because this is life ourself, and we want to see that everybody be blessed." 
Maxwell: Thank you so much. 
(tape turned off and on) This is Reverend Flemons and his wife in early 2002, and the picture we just showed before it was Reverend Flemons in about 1947, here in Flagstaff, with his Bible and his guitar. 
Flemons: Um, I don’t know, 1941. 
Maxwell: In 1941? And you were Air Force? Do you remember your rank? 
Flemons: Yes, private first class. 
[END OF INTERVIEW]