Zeb Crisp, Hazel Creek, Swain County, North Carolina
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Zeb Crisp, of Hazel Creek in Swain County, North Carolina, was 64 years old when recorded in 1939. He had some formal education and worked as a farmer and logger.
[transcripption copyrigh Michael Montgomery and Paul Reed, 2017]
[C = Zeb Crisp; I = Interviewer Joseph Hall]
C: Here we go.
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C: All right, Z. V. Crisp, was born in North Carolina, uh age is about sixty-four, you hear that? my daddy was borned in North Carolina.
I: Where?
C: In Swain County, both of us, in Swain County, I herded cattle on the Smoky Mountain, let’s see, it’s been about thirty, about thirty-two years since I herded any cattle on the North Carolina side, Tennesseans, on their Tennessee side of the, Tennesseans herded cattle, top of Smoky was the line, the state line, Tennessee and North Carolina, between Tennessee and North Carolina.
I: About where along the top of Smoky was it?
C: Well, I herded right, herded lots right along on the line right on top of Smoky, lots of cattle, yeah, that was where we first tuck them to when we first tuck them up there, we took them right on top, but we kept them on this side the most of the time, yeah, on the nor-, North Carolina side.
I: Did you herd them as far down as Gregory Bald?
C: Yes, yeah, we herded them plumb on down, way pretty low down.
I: As far as Swain County?
C: Yeah, far as, yeah, went to Clingmans Dome with them lots of times, yeah, Clingmans Dome.
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C: Yeah, we, we kept them on the, on what them, what we call on top of the Meadows, right on top of the Smoky Mountain mostly there where we, the tame grass was sowed.
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C: That was what they call the, the Siler Meadows.
I: Siler Meadows?
C: Siler Meadows, yeah, that’s right, Siler Meadows.
I: And there’s tame grass on it?
C: Tame grass sowed there, yeah, I guess they was about ten or twelve acres in tame grass sowed up there.
I: Is there any cabin you stayed in up there?
C: Yeah, there’s cabins, we had cabins up there right along on top.
I: What did you call those cabins?
C: Uh I don’t know.
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C: No, I don’t think they had.
I: Log cabins?
C: Well, there, there was one up there they called the Hall Cabin, and the Tennesseans, they stayed in that most of the time.
I: And the Spence Place?
C: Yeah, the Spence Place, yeah, let’s see, what they called the Spence Cabin too, they had a cabin there, Spence Cabin.
I: How many cattle did you have up there?
C: Well, we’ve had I guess fifteen and twenty at a time, lots of times, or less sometimes.
I: Did you stay up there with them all the time?
C: Well, not all the time, we didn’t, but then a while there at the, along towards the last, a year or two before we quit, why we, we kept a man there with them all the time.
I: Did you leave the cattle up there in the winter time?
C: Yeah, lots of them, we’d leave lots of cattle up there in the winter time, horses too.
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C: Oh hogs was there all the time, yeah.
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C: Yeah, the sheep, we kept sheep there all the time, winter and summer.
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I: Did the bears bother the hogs and cattle up there at all?
C: Never did, never did know a cow or brute caught in my life up there with a, by a bear.
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C: Well, the best there that, what I figured out that the bear had plenty other stuff to eat without catching the cattle, had wild stuff, wildcats, panthers, wild hogs, plenty of them.
I: How long since you've seen a wolf up here?
C: Well, I’m going to have to guess at that but then I can guess pretty close, I guess it’s a-, been about forty year, yeah.
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C: Yeah, I know, I know all about that, it’s terrible, well, it killed them sheep down there next to the, below the Chambers Creek, and we got after hit and run it right up top of the mountain, and it cut up on top of the bald, it took right up to the top of the bald and right up to the top of Smoky, right up to the top of hit, we run it about a day and night.
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C: Well, let’s see, ran him on top of the, top of Smoky, and we, the dogs, they stopped, and the men followed him one night till, nearly all night, and he got away from them, and that’s the last you ever seed of any wolf in this country, never seed nary another wolf in this country anymore.
I: Have you ever heard of the xx around here?
C: No, I never have since I come here, never have heard that, no.
I: Could you tell us about a good cure for warts?
C: Yeah, I can tell you about how I’ve cured them a many a time, yeah, just get you two moles and take them in your hand and smother them, don’t, don’t mash them to kill them but just smother them to death, two of them, and then you can rub them warts with your hands, and I haven’t, I can just take them off or I have a many a time, I guess I’ve took off five, I’ve took off five hundred I guess in all, in light of what I have.
I: You couldn’t tell us about how you put out a fire in a burn, could you?
C: Naw, I don’t know, don’t know nothing about that.
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C: Well, I could, I could tell you something about the weather and such like as that if you want, want me to do that, I can tell you how the weather used to be back when I was a boy like and a man, getting a man growed, used to be a rough weather up there, I’ve been there lots of times that I could stay on top, and it would come a storm and cold weather, why I’d have to get off down in the hollows to just to get out of them, I’ve had my mustache to freeze, freeze till I could hardly get my breath, and had, few minutes, saw it rain, looked like it was raining down in the country and no rain up there many a time, seed the snow up there lie there for I guess for sixty days, never melt many a time, now lately I don’t find it this day and time that way.
I: ... cattle froze?
C: Yeah, our c-, c-, cattle, our cattle froze and about in the spring of the year, come a spell of snow, and it covered the cattle up, lots of them nearly, nearly covered them up, nearly covered up with snow, and they was lots of them died, they had their head laid back, turned back on them there now and they found them dead with their head alive, back on them, turned back just like they was a-sleeping, the cattle were dead.
I: How did they look?
C: Well, sir, they looked just as natural, they, the cows didn’t look like they was anything the matter with them, not a thing in the world, just looked as nice as if they was a-living, but they were dead.
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C: Yeah, there was lots of them in a pile together, I don’t know how many we caught, seed them lying in, piled up in the snow dead.
I: Is that how Bone Valley got its name was the cattle froze?
C: Well, I think Bone Valley had its name before that, I don’t know how come hit to get its name, but I’ve heard it before that.
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C: Well, I don’t know about that.