Jan-09

GW and CJ Meet Again after 66 years.

                   Dr. Curtis J. Way (CJ) left and Mr. George Green (GW) right; Photo is by Vanessa F. Way

In Columbia South Carolina the 2008-2009 Holiday Season helped to put two childhood friends back together

after sixty-six years. A mutual friend of both of these men, Ms. Debbie Kilgore, who had for years heard GW

talk about where he was born heard over the Holidays Dr. Way talk about where he was born.  With that

 information she put the two of these men together again after all of these years. Both of these men were born

and raised in a part of Columbia that not many folk today even know existed. Debbie said, “I knew they had to

know each other because I have never heard anyone but GW who talks about this place.” The site of these

men’s birth is the area where the Ronald McDonald House and the Richland Memorial Hospital is located.

The area spans from Farrow Road to North Main Street. That area was once known as Smith’s Quarters.

The property was Owned by Mr. John C. B. Smith and the family had about a dozen old houses left over

from the plantation days that were called “Smith Quarters.” When CJ and GW sat down to talk they had a

joyous time talking about the good old days when their families paid $4.00 a month rent for houses that few

families today would be willing to live. GW laughingly says that his house had no flooring and he slept on the

ground on what his mother called a pallet. He said his family thought that CJ’s family had it made because

they had a house up off the ground with floors and windows. CJ talked about how his family thought that

GW’s family had it made because GW’s family had cows and plenty of milk and butter. Both of these men

talk about hard times and hard living while joking about how happy they are to have had the experience. CJ

has such fond memories of the area that he now calls it a Garden of Eden because he is mindful of the fact

that all of these families had enough land and crops to survive without money. A family of six could live on

less than twenty-five dollars a month with the kinds of gardens and animals they had.

Both of theses men went to Booker Washington Heights School. The school was located off of what are now

Beltline Blvd. and Farrow Road. As they talked it was revealed that GW had to drop out of school because

both of his parents died of pneumonia within the same week. GW says he worked as a share-cropper on the

site where the old Keenan High School is located. He said he worked from sun up to sun down just to have a

place for him and his two sisters to live. He says he got no pay or any share of the crop even though it was

called share cropping. GW also says he later worked for money he did not get in a cement block factory to

make the ornamental blocks for the Cornell Arms building on Sumter Street in Columbia. CJ says he worked

while in school about thirty-one hours a week from Friday to Sunday morning for two dollars. He worked in

a grocery store owned by his uncle, Zellie George, in an area of Columbia called Taylor’s. CJ and GW had

a lot of laughs about life in Columbia and what things cost in the 1940s; a cola for a nickel, a gallon of

kerosene for sixteen cents and a gallon of gas for twenty nine cents. CJ says, “If you had fifteen cents you

could impress a girl by buying two colas and a cinnamon bun.” This meant that you and the girl had a soda

each but you had to share the cinnamon bun. “My, oh my that was good,” Dr. Way says as he asks, “Where

are all of the folk from Booker Washington Heights’ School? Both of these men want anyone who attended

Booker Washington Heights to contact them at 803-691-0146 or email at spoonbooks1@AOL.com to just

check in and maybe have a reunion of sorts to talk about the good old days. GW now lives off Hardscrabble

Road near Farrow Road and CJ now lives off Hardscrabble Road in Blythewood.

GW’s pride and joy now is his granddaughter, Latoisha Green, who is a freshman at Clemson University.

She was an Honor Graduate (third in Class) at Keenan High in 2008. GW is so proud of her that he painted

the front of his house Clemson colors when she went off to school. He says that she, “Keeps me young and

I want her to get the education that I could not get.” CJ says that he feels just as fondly of his niece Vanessa

F. Way who is now in the process of transferring from Winthrop College to the University of North Carolina.

Dr. Curtis J. Way says Vanessa can’t keep him young but he is investing in her because she and all of the

other young folk in school are the future of our people. GW and CJ have been talking by phone and visiting

regularly since Debbie put them back together. Debbie says these old men are now acting like they are

playmates in an elementary school. GW is eight-one and CJ is seventy-three and they are grateful to God

for life and the pleasure of meeting again.

-30-

For further information contact:

Dr. Curtis J. Way

870 Langford Rd.

Blythewood SC 29016

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