This interview with Charlotte Lee was conducted on May 14, 1976. The interview subject was born in 1909, she was 67 years old at the time of the interview. The interview discusses her great-grandmother, who was a free Black woman, and how she purchased her great-grandfather's freedom in Virginia before settling in Boston, where they were active in the Underground Railroad. She goes on to discuss her family, life in Newport (R.I.), Providence (R.I.), religion, work, and community. In addition to the audio recording of the interview, there is a typed summary and abstract.
Original abstract (1976) reads: "Mrs. Lee is a very reticent woman and it took some probing to get her to respond. I think she opened up as the interview progressed and provided useful and interesting information. She traced her family origins to Virginia, where her great-grandfather was a slave and her great-grandmother was a free Black. The latter moved to Boston, worked and saved $1,000. to buy her husband's freedom. The husband came to Boston and the family was active in the Underground Railroad. Mrs. Lee's more immediate family later lived in Malden and in a Black neighborhood i n Boston's West End. Her mother and father were from this community. In 1907 her parents moved t o Newport and lived in various sections of a largely black but integrated neighborhood on West Broadway. Mrs. Lee was born in 1909 and talked about her childhood in Newport (work, schooling and church). In 1925 the family moved to Providence and settled in a predominantly Black-Jewish neighborhood near where the University Heights Center stands today. Again, menial work and the Black church were important parts of her life . She decided to study to become a nurse and had t o move to Harlem for training. Two sisters, graduates of Rhode Island College, were forced to move to all-Black schools in the South to teach. Mrs. Lee lived in New York until 1949 when she married an East Providence man and returned to Rhode Island. She lived in a couple of small Black communities in Bast Providence and moved to her present home in East Providence in 1957. The area is now a small Black neighborhood."
Original abstract (1976) reads: "Mrs. Lee is a very reticent woman and it took some probing to get her to respond. I think she opened up as the interview progressed and provided useful and interesting information. She traced her family origins to Virginia, where her great-grandfather was a slave and her great-grandmother was a free Black. The latter moved to Boston, worked and saved $1,000. to buy her husband's freedom. The husband came to Boston and the family was active in the Underground Railroad. Mrs. Lee's more immediate family later lived in Malden and in a Black neighborhood i n Boston's West End. Her mother and father were from this community. In 1907 her parents moved t o Newport and lived in various sections of a largely black but integrated neighborhood on West Broadway. Mrs. Lee was born in 1909 and talked about her childhood in Newport (work, schooling and church). In 1925 the family moved to Providence and settled in a predominantly Black-Jewish neighborhood near where the University Heights Center stands today. Again, menial work and the Black church were important parts of her life . She decided to study to become a nurse and had t o move to Harlem for training. Two sisters, graduates of Rhode Island College, were forced to move to all-Black schools in the South to teach. Mrs. Lee lived in New York until 1949 when she married an East Providence man and returned to Rhode Island. She lived in a couple of small Black communities in Bast Providence and moved to her present home in East Providence in 1957. The area is now a small Black neighborhood."