Camp Meeting: Unity Grove

<v Choir>[singing] <v Mrs. Hammond>Family is a word that embodies <v Mrs. Hammond>a great deal more than just members of a group. <v Mrs. Hammond>To me, family is closeness, <v Mrs. Hammond>loving, sharing and being there when somebody <v Mrs. Hammond>needs you, family <v Mrs. Hammond>is somebody you can lean on when you're

<v Mrs. Hammond>having problems. Somebody who can call on to help you. <v Mrs. Hammond>When you're in distress or when you're ill, you wouldn't you wouldn't call calling <v Mrs. Hammond>a stranger to do that or are just a casual acquaintance. <v Mrs. Hammond>But you don't have to take somebody who's a member of your family. <v Mrs. Hammond>So I think maybe if it's a close knit group <v Mrs. Hammond>that cares a great deal about the other members of the <v Mrs. Hammond>group and there's a- as a biological <v Mrs. Hammond>family, the mother and the father and the children. <v Mrs. Hammond>But then, like this camp meeting is a family too in a way. <v Mrs. Hammond>Everybody who goes is a member of that bigger family and I think they <v Mrs. Hammond>get so that they care a great deal what happens to the other members and <v Mrs. Hammond>they share. You need to grow. <v Preacher>We are happy you are here

<v Mrs. Hammond>In addition to the material things you're hearing, the camp meeting, which is an <v Mrs. Hammond>experience that you share with them. <v Mrs. Hammond>A camp meeting a revival <v Mrs. Hammond>of sorts. But itit's a meeting that has a historical <v Mrs. Hammond>background in this community, the people go out and live in the in the <v Mrs. Hammond>tents Of course, they don't look much like Tents, they look more like Barns. <v Mrs. Hammond>But they live there for the entire week and they cook on the grounds and go home and take <v Mrs. Hammond>care of the chores and then come back and live there at night. <v Mrs. Hammond>And attend the services and it lasts for a whole week, three services a day <v Mrs. Hammond>for an entire week. <v Mrs. Hammond>They are there between services. They visit with neighbors and friends, just <v Mrs. Hammond>sit in the shade and talk. [laughing] <v Mrs. Hammond>Before <v Mrs. Hammond>each service so that everybody will have time to round up

<v Mrs. Hammond>the kids and get the muddy clothes off and get them changed <v Mrs. Hammond>30 minutes before service begins, Mr. <v Mrs. Hammond>Frank Durr flares the horn and it used to be a big old cow horn. <v Mrs. Hammond>Now he blows the thing like a trumpet. <v Mr. Frank Durr>Well, Mr. ?Law Shelton? <v Mr. Frank Durr>he was the man who blowed the horn for when I first began to come

<v Mr. Frank Durr>here. 'till long as we had camp meetings until we quit <v Mr. Frank Durr>1913. <v Mr. Frank Durr>The Dogs used to follow the wagons here when they come and stayed <v Mr. Frank Durr>and when he blowed the horn, they'd be a bunch of 'em, gathered around him and howl and <v Mr. Frank Durr>make a lot of wreck. <v Mr. Frank Durr>And it- start in 1926,I went to <v Mr. Frank Durr>blow on the horn, been blowing regular ever since. <v Mr. Frank Durr>This here, Harbor has been built since back in May 18 and <v Mr. Frank Durr>40s or 50s, according to what I've heard old people say, <v Mr. Frank Durr>when I walk under there at any time If rhere's nobody along with me in my <v Mr. Frank Durr>mind, I see a lot of people sitting under there. <v Mr. Frank Durr>And I can still recall and remember some of the people I

<v Mr. Frank Durr>heard shout, They'd get happy and shout. <v Mr. Frank Durr>[singing] <v Mr. Frank Durr>I remember it was old people when <v Mr. Frank Durr>I first remember and I can remember them and see 'em come <v Mr. Frank Durr>under, they're going out in my mind. <v Mrs. Hammond>The cabins are called tents, I think, because it's just tradition. <v Mrs. Hammond>They have enough property there that if you build a tent, you can cut trees and <v Mrs. Hammond>make your tent and for rally. <v Mrs. Hammond>If a man wanted to build a new tent, he would just set a date for it. <v Mrs. Hammond>And all the men in the community, particularly other tent holders, would come in and <v Mrs. Hammond>they work together and build a tent and they'd build it ina day. <v Mrs. Hammond>Some people now come in campers and like set those up

<v Mrs. Hammond>and leave them it live and let live in it serves the same purpose. <v Mrs. Hammond>People who haven't camped before, who decide that they are [unclear], <v Mrs. Hammond>find this family atmosphere and many of them who <v Mrs. Hammond>haven't had strong family ties in their biological family decided <v Mrs. Hammond>they liked it. And they come back year after year after year. <v Mrs. Hammond>I know we've got a couple who tent with families who started out that <v Mrs. Hammond>way. They came just as young people by themselves to share <v Mrs. Hammond>a vacant tent. And then when they married and had children of their own, they came back <v Mrs. Hammond>and decided they wanted their kids to have that kind of experience. <v Mrs. Hammond>And I think it sort of grows on. <v Mrs. Hammond>Well, a lot of people who share, you know various tents are <v Mrs. Hammond>all relatives in one way or another to other people.

<v Mrs. Hammond>And this is mainly how they hear about it [unclear] <v Mrs. Hammond>There hasn't been a new tent built I'd say in 20 years, maybe longer. <v Mrs. Hammond>It probably was called a vacation for a farm mother because it allowed her to get out of <v Mrs. Hammond>the house and up until I'd say the last <v Mrs. Hammond>10 years. Everybody who attended had a cook. <v Mrs. Hammond>It was a thing and the cooks enjoyed it as much as the is the farm wife did. <v Mrs. Hammond>And a good cook was something that you treasured <v Mrs. Hammond>in the- you hung on to year after year after year. <v Mrs. Hammond>Now, the ladies who tent do their own cooking, and it does <v Mrs. Hammond>take away part of i that vacation idea. <v Mrs. Hammond>Still, you're out. <v Mrs. Hammond>And it's more or less like going camping.

<v Mrs. Hammond>You're out of the house and you're on a dirt floor. <v Mrs. Hammond>And if you spill grease you don't have to grab the mop. <v Mrs. Hammond>And it's casual, very casual. <v Mrs. Hammond>The cooking facilities are very primitive. <v Mrs. Hammond>Twenty five years ago, everybody had woodstoves <v Mrs. Hammond>and they'd haul out loads of stove wood to be used <v Mrs. Hammond>for the camp meeting week and they'd have crates and chickens that they fattened and <v Mrs. Hammond>set aside for that. <v Mrs. Hammond>And the cook shed. <v Mrs. Hammond>The kitchen was called a cook shed, and it was set apart from the rest of the <v Mrs. Hammond>tent, mainly to keep the heat out.

<v Mrs. Hammond>I suppose. <v Mrs. Hammond>Well, the old way of doing things has always been important to the people of <v Mrs. Hammond>this community. They resist change <v Mrs. Hammond>not only in the church but in local customs and the way people do <v Mrs. Hammond>things. <v Mrs. Hammond>There was a time up until just a few years ago, everybody had <v Mrs. Hammond>an ice box and the ice truck came out from reform. <v Mrs. Hammond>Every other day and you'd buy 100 pounds of ice and put it in the old ice <v Mrs. Hammond>box and set your milk in there and it'd spoil anyway. <v Mrs. Hammond>But you made it do for a week. <v Mrs. Hammond>It was a lot of fun. <v Mrs. Hammond>You know, they just live for camp meeting, a lot of the older people do. <v Mrs. Hammond>I find that this is not so much true with the younger people <v Mrs. Hammond>[preaching] they are more casual about it.

<v Mrs. Hammond>And it could be that as time passes and the older members <v Mrs. Hammond>pass on, that this will lose some of its significance. <v Mrs. Hammond>But so far it hasn't. <v Mrs. Hammond>[preaching] The people cling to it as a theme of it is here, and it's ours and we're <v Mrs. Hammond>going to keep it, we aren't going to change <v Mrs. Hammond>it [preaching] <v Mrs. Hammond>Let's talk about Generation Gap. I don't really know what one is. <v Mrs. Hammond>I think you can talk to anybody if you put your mind to it. <v Mrs. Hammond>But I think a true generation gap would be where the parents and the children lose <v Mrs. Hammond>contact with each other so that they have very little in common.

<v Mrs. Hammond>And I find that in this particular community. <v Mrs. Hammond>People keep up with their kid. Most of them do. <v Mrs. Hammond>And what they're doing. <v Mrs. Hammond>If it's a member of the family, You hold it together in the name. <v Mrs. Hammond>This is true in rural America. <v Mrs. Hammond>I'd like to see a return to basics <v Mrs. Hammond>in American life. <v Mrs. Hammond>And by that I mean the things that <v Mrs. Hammond>we value now are not the kind of things that we valued <v Mrs. Hammond>before. <v Mrs. Hammond>I think we need to get back to where we feel that that <v Mrs. Hammond>keeping up with the kids and what they are doing. <v Mrs. Hammond>That's one of the things that America needs. <v Mrs. Hammond>The social life in this community, particularly, <v Mrs. Hammond>is centered around the churches because there is nothing else.

<v Mrs. Hammond>Once upon a time there was a school and they had, you know, PTA <v Mrs. Hammond>and plays and ball games and that sort of thing. <v Mrs. Hammond>But the school has been closed and the churches are <v Mrs. Hammond>about all that's left. <v Mrs. Hammond>If you don't go to church, you don't see your neighbors. <v Preacher>[Preaching]. <v Mrs. Hammond>They had several ladies in this community who, when the preacher <v Mrs. Hammond>would preach and exhort the congregation, they would <v Mrs. Hammond>be moved to shout. <v Mrs. Hammond>And so the young people pretty soon learned not to look at the people <v Mrs. Hammond>when they were when they were shouting, unless they want to be pulled down to the altar <v Mrs. Hammond>too, of course. Sometimes they wanted to go and they just didn't have

<v Mrs. Hammond>courage enough to step out on their own. <v Mrs. Hammond>But one particular lady, if you looked her in the eye, you could just get ready to be <v Mrs. Hammond>grabbed and carried down to the altar because she'd take you down and pray for you. <v Mrs. Hammond>When when the peak would get happy and shout and they called it getting happy. <v Mrs. Hammond>And it would make the services, sometimes it'd make <v Mrs. Hammond>you laugh a long time into the night because no minister in his right mind would stop it. <v Mrs. Hammond>When somebody with that kind of an experience, people don't shout in church like that. <v Mrs. Hammond>anymore. I haven't heard it in years and years and I'm sorry to see <v Mrs. Hammond>it pass. <v Mrs. Hammond>The services don't try nearly the audiences that they did. <v Mrs. Hammond>Fifteen or twenty years ago when I was young <v Mrs. Hammond>and my father used to bring us over here to night services, sometimes <v Mrs. Hammond>you couldn't even get under the tabernacle and people would come

<v Mrs. Hammond>long distances to the night services. <v Mrs. Hammond>Now the groups that come are very small. <v Mrs. Hammond>You don't have nearly so many people. <v Mrs. Hammond>There was not many young people in the community. <v Mrs. Hammond>Not nearly as many as they were then. <v Mrs. Hammond>Well, camp meeting has changed over the years in that it has become more <v Mrs. Hammond>like other church services. <v Mrs. Hammond>But I've heard some of the older people grumble about it. <v Mrs. Hammond>This isn't like camp meeting and they'd rather it were the same way it was <v Mrs. Hammond>years and years ago. <v Mrs. Hammond>There have been some changes, but they have come by them rather hard. <v Mrs. Hammond>Well, we're already seeing the family unit break

<v Mrs. Hammond>up. And in our society and I think in the rural areas, is where it is holding together <v Mrs. Hammond>the longest. <v Mrs. Hammond>Every family used to have one day a year when everybody <v Mrs. Hammond>came and they get together and have a reunion and have lots of good things to eat. <v Mrs. Hammond>They spend the whole day just visiting and looking at all the new babies. <v Mrs. Hammond>And speaking to all the older members of the family and and asking what had <v Mrs. Hammond>passed during the year. <v Mrs. Hammond>And you don't think much of that anymore. <v Mrs. Hammond>But as social change filters down into rural <v Mrs. Hammond>America, we'll see the same thing. I think. <v Mrs. Hammond>And the farm families will become just as <v Mrs. Hammond>scattered and just these loosely knit as

<v Mrs. Hammond>the city families have. In the long run, I suppose <v Mrs. Hammond>it will have families who will become <v Mrs. Hammond>so scattered that they lose contact. <v Mrs. Hammond>And I'm sure that it's going to have an adverse effect on family life, <v Mrs. Hammond>big family life. What I mean where children and grandchildren and everybody gets back to <v Mrs. Hammond>see the old folks. <v Mrs. Hammond>The community needs people coming in rather than people going out all the time. <v Mrs. Hammond>With the exodus <v Mrs. Hammond>of young people going into the urban areas to earn money, so many <v Mrs. Hammond>of them don't come back and so many of the of the farms here, so many of the houses, <v Mrs. Hammond>just have two people to a house. <v Mrs. Hammond>When those people die, they will be nobody unless

<v Mrs. Hammond>some of the young people decide that when they have worked out their time in the city <v Mrs. Hammond>they want to retire and come back to the old home place. <v Mrs. Hammond>In our case, we work the way long enough to earn enough that we could afford to come <v Mrs. Hammond>back. So you. It's hard to earn a living on a farm <v Mrs. Hammond>anymore. And particularly if you have to buy the farm <v Mrs. Hammond>and you have to build a house and you have to buy equipment. <v Mrs. Hammond>A farmer can hardly do that. <v Mrs. Hammond>Just farming. <v Mrs. Hammond>You have to work at something else in order to be able to afford to be a farmer. <v Mrs. Hammond>And a lot of people just don't like the effort. <v Mrs. Hammond>You may work twice as hard on the farm, but you're working because you see something you <v Mrs. Hammond>want to be there, not because somebody is leaning on you and say, you've got to do this. <v Mrs. Hammond>In fact, somebody worked hard at a job as he works on this farm. <v Mrs. Hammond>He'd quit years ago, he really put

<v Mrs. Hammond>in some long days. But he feels that it's his job and he wants <v Mrs. Hammond>to do it. And he enjoyed it thoroughly <v Mrs. Hammond>People who grew up on the farms, even though they get away from it. <v Mrs. Hammond>They always in the back of their subconscious. <v Mrs. Hammond>There is that feeling of freedom that you have that you have out here. <v Mrs. Hammond>I think that part of it is just feeling so peaceful. <v Mrs. Hammond>And not having to run at anything or rush to get to anything. <v Mrs. Hammond>You know, you can do what you want to a when you want to. <v Mrs. Hammond>And if you don't want to do anything, you just don't do anything. <v Mrs. Hammond>And that the best part of all. <v Mrs. Hammond>I don't know whether Camp meeting can be perpetuated. <v Mrs. Hammond>I think it would depend on the moral climate of this community. <v Mrs. Hammond>And I don't really know whether we have enough people who will remain

<v Mrs. Hammond>that devoted to it. Now, I'm sure that the descendants of the Durov's <v Mrs. Hammond>and the Hammond's will try to keep it <v Mrs. Hammond>to keep it going. I don't know whether they'll succeed, <v Mrs. Hammond>but maybe. <v Aubrey Miller>Hi, I'm Aubrey Miller, Meeting at Unity Grove is more than just

<v Aubrey Miller>a meeting, more than just an event that took place at a certain time. <v Aubrey Miller>It's a group of people and it's an idea, an idea that we hope will live on. <v Aubrey Miller>The film itself is available to organizations around the state of Alabama and around the <v Aubrey Miller>country from University of Alabama. <v Aubrey Miller>You can get information about the film by writing. <v Aubrey Miller>Bill Hunter. Post Office Box X at the University of Alabama. <v Aubrey Miller>We'll have with us today Bill Hunter. <v Aubrey Miller>And Mrs. Hammond. <v Aubrey Miller>Two people who were instrumental in the film Bill because he filmed it and Mrs. Hammond <v Aubrey Miller>because she did most of the narration Bill. <v Aubrey Miller>Were there any things at the camp meeting itself which drew you closer to the people <v Aubrey Miller>involved in it? <v Bill Hunter>Yes. Probably just meeting people and how friendly they were. <v Bill Hunter>How warm the community was and then being accepted by them and they <v Bill Hunter>were very open to us and our cameras and crew that worked. <v Aubrey Miller>Well, you know, there are some limits beyond which the camera cannot go.

<v Aubrey Miller>Mrs. Hammond were there are some things at the camp meeting that were not captured <v Aubrey Miller>by film that you could tell us about. <v Mrs. Hammond>Yes, quite a bit. <v Mrs. Hammond>I think that there's a great deal of closeness among people that <v Mrs. Hammond>you can't capture on film. <v Mrs. Hammond>And there's a great deal that has passed in the camp meeting <v Mrs. Hammond>that those of us who have been there for a lot of years remember and those things can't <v Mrs. Hammond>be captured on film either. <v Mrs. Hammond>And those are the things that only the people who have been there really know about <v Mrs. Hammond>as far as past camp meetings are concerned. <v Aubrey Miller>How does this one compare with some of the ones that you've witnessed in the past? <v Mrs. Hammond>Well, the crowds are smaller, as we pointed out during the filming, much smaller. <v Mrs. Hammond>It used to cover the whole hillside on night services and <v Mrs. Hammond>then the the choir and the singing is not the same. <v Mrs. Hammond>There was a quality about it a long time ago when some of the elderly people <v Mrs. Hammond>saying, I think I'll have trouble.

<v Mrs. Hammond>And this was really exciting when they would do that. <v Mrs. Hammond>And I don't think anybody does that anymore. <v Mrs. Hammond>We had one particular lady who did it, and it would it would really <v Mrs. Hammond>give you a thrill. When she'd start, you'd get goose bumps. <v Aubrey Miller>You mentioned about, the shouting part. And I think I saw Bill laugh when this was when <v Aubrey Miller>the film was on. <v Aubrey Miller>Has shouting died out? <v Mrs. Hammond>Yes, it has Yes, it has. <v Mrs. Hammond>I haven't witnessed any of that for a long, long time. <v Mrs. Hammond>Of course, I have never felt inclined toward that sort of thing. <v Mrs. Hammond>But there used to be quite a number of ladies in the community who did <v Mrs. Hammond>shout during the services and that this is something that we miss <v Mrs. Hammond>very much. I don't know. <v Mrs. Hammond>It would be something that the preacher would say, something that they would feel let <v Mrs. Hammond>down the rest of us knew about. But it was sort of like an electric feeling in the air. <v Mrs. Hammond>And when one of them would start, others would join in and <v Mrs. Hammond>they called it getting happy and they'd go down the aisle and and sort of do a little <v Mrs. Hammond>shuffle and kick sawdust from one side to the other.

<v Mrs. Hammond>And that wound up in the altar. <v Mrs. Hammond>And it was a very emotional flame. <v Aubrey Miller>I guess we've come become just a little bit too much sophisticated. <v Mrs. Hammond>I would say so, Blasé. <v Aubrey Miller>Bill did you feel in any way obtrusive when you're marching into these church <v Aubrey Miller>services with a camera? <v Bill Hunter>Yes, it's kind of out of place to be in a church service with a camera in the first <v Bill Hunter>place, you know, people sitting around and listening <v Bill Hunter>to the sermon. And you have to be a little bit pushy with the camera to get to <v Bill Hunter>get pictures, you know, people. <v Bill Hunter>But they were very warm to me and and very true. <v Bill Hunter>Very realistic to, you know, the kind of feeling we're trying <v Bill Hunter>to put across. <v Aubrey Miller>Well, you know, I imagine this took a long time. <v Aubrey Miller>The camp meeting went on for a week, but some as far as the mechanics of putting <v Aubrey Miller>the whole thing together for you, what? <v Aubrey Miller>How much time did it involve? <v Bill Hunter>Well, we went down because it can't mean this for one week <v Bill Hunter>each year. Then we went down for two different years.

<v Bill Hunter>And, you know, the same people each year were around that <v Bill Hunter>helped us. And so we were able to get a better <v Bill Hunter>picture of what was going on because we did go down for two different years. <v Bill Hunter>And I mean-. <v Aubrey Miller>To a large extent, letting the whole thing become a part of you. <v Bill Hunter>Sure. I plan to go back this year and and see my friends. <v Aubrey Miller>Mrs. Hammond. Did the people feel like they were being intruded <v Aubrey Miller>upon by Bill and Jennifer when they came out with their cameras? <v Mrs. Hammond>No, we were conscious that they were there, but everybody <v Mrs. Hammond>was cooperative. Everybody appreciated what the what they were doing. <v Mrs. Hammond>And I feel that they were very unobtrusive and <v Mrs. Hammond>they. We're doing they were trying very, very hard not to interfere, but I'm sure the <v Mrs. Hammond>minister failed. You know, you just can't. <v Mrs. Hammond>You're bound to feel that there's something different there. <v Mrs. Hammond>Something in the way that other people are noticing rather than listening closely to what <v Mrs. Hammond>you're saying. And I think maybe he felt this more within the people in the congregation

<v Mrs. Hammond>there. It must have been awfully hard for him. <v Aubrey Miller>What relationship is him and does this camp bear to the old revival? <v Mrs. Hammond>Well, it's pretty much the same thing, except this is more like the revivals <v Mrs. Hammond>of 100 years ago. It's out in the open and it's <v Mrs. Hammond>it's more informal. <v Mrs. Hammond>Church services have become very formalized, you know, by prayer ahead of time. <v Mrs. Hammond>What they gonna do, what they're gonna sing. <v Mrs. Hammond>And all of that and at, at a camp meeting. <v Mrs. Hammond>It's not that way totally. <v Mrs. Hammond>There's some of that and they're getting more of that into it. <v Mrs. Hammond>And I regret that very much. <v Mrs. Hammond>I'd like it to stay simple. <v Aubrey Miller>Is this a Southern tradition, the camp meeting? <v Mrs. Hammond>Originally, I think they had them all over the country, but I think it has it has become <v Mrs. Hammond>a southern thing now. I don't think there are too many of them in other parts of the <v Mrs. Hammond>country. Not that I'm aware of anyhow. <v Aubrey Miller>Listen, thanks to both of you. And remember that people can <v Aubrey Miller>acquire this film by calling the University of Alabama or writing Post office box X.

<v Aubrey Miller>University, Alabama.