Lula Mae Haynes Black and Pilgrim Black in New York

Lula Mae Haynes Black and Pilgrim Black in New York

Lula and Pilgrim Black

Upstate New York (N.Y.)

Migrant workers

Wayne County (N.Y.)

Agricultural laborers--New York (State)

Farm laborers

Huron (N.Y. : Town)

Lula Mae Haynes Black (1917-2007) and Pilgrim Black (1905-2002) in the kitchen of the "big house" of the migrant worker camp in Wayne County, New York. This is the kitchen where Lula operated her restaurant, despite the lack of running water. In this photograph, Pilgrim is drinking morning coffee before going to work as a migrant crew leader.

Pilgrim Black was born in 1905, although some records list 1907 as his birth year. Pilgrim and Lula Mae Haynes (1917-2007) Black were migrant crew leaders, and thus migrated to Wayne County in Upstate New York in the summers and back to their home in Sanford for the rest of the year. Pilgrim was the son of Harry Black (d. 1911) and Maggie Benjamin Black (ca.1870-ca.1934), who migrated to Sanford from South Carolina in the 1800s. Harry and Maggie had several children: Leckward Black, Mustar Black, Malachi Black, Leatha Black Walker (1889-1976), Pilgrim Black, Margaret Black Jones (1889-1976), and Harriett Black Lawson. In 1911, Harry owned a grocery store at 206 South Sanford Avenue. One day, he came home from work with pneumonia and passed away shortly thereafter. Pilgrim was nine years old when his father passed away. Maggie was the daughter of former slaves, Isaac and Roseanna Benjamin, and the sister of Nathan Benjamin, Pledge Benjamin, Sam Benjamin, Loui Benjamin, Chainey Benjamin, Lara Benjamin, Melvina Benjamin, and Katie Benjamin.

Pilgrim had to quit school at age 11 in order to provide for his mother, originally working in a mill house until he was 18 years old. After declining a management position, he traveled to Wayne County to pick cherries, apples, pears, and other crops. He broke a bone after falling from an apple tree his first year and decided to try farm labor on a potato farm in Red Creek, New York, instead. Don Holdridge, the farmer who owned the land, noted Pilgrim's high rate of productivity and offered him a management position supervising up to thirty workers at once, which he accepted.

While in Sanford, Pilgrim also worked as a foreman in Sanford for Chase & Company for over 30 years. He married Lula in 1937 and they had several children together, including Vivian Louise Black (1940- ); Lula Yvonne Black (1942- ); Charles Samuel Black (1945- ); Pilgrim Black, Jr. (ca.1947- ), and Patricia Ann Black (1956- ).

Original color photograph: Private Collection of Patricia Ann Black.

ca. 1960-1969

Black, Patricia Ann

Digital reproduction of original color photograph.

The Magazine of Wayne County History, Vol. II, Iss. I, page 4.

image/jpg

152 KB

1 color photograph

Still Image

Huron, New York

Donation

History Teacher

Originally owned by Pilgrim Black.

Inherited by Patricia Ann Black in 2002.

Copyright to the resource is held by Patricia Ann Black and is provided here by RICHES of Central Florida for educational purposes only.

Cepero, Laura

Private Collection of Patricia Ann Black

Coles, Robert. Uprooted Children: The Early Life of Migrant Farm Workers. [Pittsburgh]: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1970.

Piore, Michael J. Birds of Passage: Migrant Labor and Industrial Societies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979.

1 color photograph