| Summary: | (3:00) Mr. Cooper discusses his life in Florence, Alabama before joining the Army.Florence- Lauderdale Public Library
Interview with Roy Cooper
May 12, 2010
Florence, Alabama
Conducted by Clint Alley and Rhonda Haygood
Clip 5a
Clint Alley: Well, when were you born?
Roy Cooper: I was born in Cloverdale, Alabama, 9th of July in 1918 and I graduated from Central High School and I came to work in Florence and I worked at Florence Shoe Store for about four years and I had this chance to get in the band to go to the Army which I took.
CA: You took it.
RC: And I worked for Mr. Israel at Florence Shoe Store and he was a nice fellow, of course I didn’t make any money. I, when I started working for him, I worked one year for my uncle, I was staying with them in town and, and I worked on, on his farm driving a tractor part of the time and part of the time, mules. And I was working on the island. That’s, you know, if you cross the river bridge, up there there’s an island? Well, they used to farm that island all the time. And this Mr. Anderson had land over there and, and that’s what I did that first year, I guess part of a year. And then, I came in one day and my uncle told me, said that he heard that, that Mr. Israel was, was, wanted to hire somebody and says, “ If you go down there you might get a job down there.” And so, I did, I went down there and, and he hired me. So, I worked for him; I worked at Florence, Florence Shoe Store and I’d wash off the vestibule and the windows and vacuum his floors and everything like that and then sell shoes all day long. And back in those days we worked six days a week, Saturday, too. And on Saturday we worked till nine o’clock. I was making eight dollars a week and was glad to get it, you know, times were, were tough back then, and so, I went in the Army from that job and course I got a raise a few times. Mr. Israel taught me a lot. He, he gave me a raise one time, it was a dollar raise and he says, “ Now,” says, “ You’re dressing all right, you’re doing okay.” Says, “ Take this dollar around to First Federal and put it in there and open a charge account.” Not a charge account, but a savings account— and I did that. And he also sent me across the street to Rogers and says, “ Go up there and see—”, I can’t remember his name, was the credit manager and the head bookkeeper and he says, “ Tell him that I sent you over here and I want you to open a charge account.” He was wanting me to, to be able to do things like that, which was pretty nice of him; and, and that’s what I did. But I did manage to save about a hundred dollars there and it came in handy.
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