Growing up in Rich Square
Toni Thorpe, the program coordinator of programs at the NCSU African American Cultural Center, describes that it was like growing up in Rich Square, North Carolina.
Interview on 2012-05-12 00:00:00 -0400
Transcript
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Well I'm from North Carolina
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from Northampton County
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small town: Rich Square, North Carolina
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However, I moved here as a transplant, sort of
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I went to - my parents are from -
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Well my mom's from Rich Square, but they lived in Washington, DC
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That's where my dad's family was from
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And I just came early, so that's how I ended up being born in Ahoskie, North Carolina
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But then they divorced when I was in middle school
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And then I moved to live with my grandma, and she moved to California
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My mom moved to California, not my grandma. I stayed here.
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So my heart and spirit and roots are in North Carolina
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I love North Carolina
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I love the crickets at night
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I love the fact that I grew up eating organic food before it was called organic
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That if I wanted - whatever we had for dinner, we went to the garden and got
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And my granddad was a butcher
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So I had no idea when I was growing up
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when relatives would come visit
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my grandma would go get steaks
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and it was a big deal, everyone always loved to come to our house to eat
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and I - it was no big deal
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even though I became a vegetarian - that drove them crazy for awhile -
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the fact is that there were t-bone steaks, the best cuts
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you know, there were hams, we always had the smell of a ham
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out in the pantry
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It just was a beautiful
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existence; lots of family
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lots of long conversations about whether the gloves matched a bag
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you know, just forty-five minutes of
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"I can't believe she had that pocketbook."
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"Did you see that pocketbook?"
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And I loved that. I was very narrative
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And it smells good, you know, the earth. I just love it.
This video is an excerpt from a longer interview. Contact the Special Collections Research Center to request the transcript of the full interview.
