At the time of this interview, Mrs. Brown was living in Waterloo, Iowa. In 1904, she was born at coal mine No. 10 in the Buxton area where she lived until age twelve. In 1916, she moved with her grandparents to Cedar Rapids. She first moved to Waterloo in 1922. Later, she lived in Ft. Dodge, Iowa and again in Cedar Rapids. She moved to Waterloo in 1951. 

Mrs. Brown's parents died while she was a child. As a result, her grandparents who were former slaves raised her. Mrs. Brown remembered, "My grandmother became a school teacher after having been born a slave. My grandfather became a barber after having been born a slave. 

And so I knew my parents such a short while. I am very proud of my father because he dug coal in the mines to become an engineer. My mother graduated from high school here in Leon, Iowa and she was a musician. The only thing I can tell you about my parents and my grandparents is that they were bitterly against ignorance in any of its forms." 

Mrs. Brown first attended school in Buxton where a large part of the community was Black. She recalled, "There were three elementary schools. Mrs. Minnie B. London was the principal of one of those schools . . .I didn't have any idea that Negroes were supposed to be second class citizens because the school teachers, doctors, lawyers, engineers . . . I had seen them all Black. 

So my school experience was a shock when I first went to Cedar Rapids. That was the first time I had ever been looked through as though I weren't existing, rather than be looked at. I did offer to play when we had school singing and whatnot. 

That was the first time I hadn't been wanted. And had it not been for that little grandmother who was born a slave and worked hard to become a schoolteacher, I don't know what the school would have done to me. So she was the joy of my life." 

Mrs. Brown vividly remembered her work experience during the Depression. She said, "Can you imagine that a time for two full years my husband was out of work? 

We had his mother living with us and I worked for five dollars a week, seven days a week doing housework which meant washing, ironing, cooking, and cleaning and the whole bit. It was very fortunate if you were able to get anything like that during the Depression" 

Mrs. Brown didn't feel that the Depression affected Black people more than white people. She hinted that the hardships of the Depression might have been less intense for the Black people than White people. 

"We had always been poor. It wasn't a new experience. So many didn't know how to be poor. We had learned the ins and outs of being poor. When you talk about being down to basics, we were there. We walked where we had to go. We cooked, we raised gardens, we sewed, yes-we were back to basics. 

But we made it. And most of us are not bitter . . . most of us are really amazed that we have come this far."