Renná McKinney: (singing) We’re going
to the laaand and we’ll never grooow oooold ooo we will neveeeer grooow oooold we will never grow
oooold, going to the land and we’ll never grow
old *singing fades* Nathaniel Keene:
My name
is Nathaniel Keene. The trustees were my relatives, the Keene's, of this building
years ago. I was raised here and of course I left and went away for, I guess, 20 some years and came
back, and I come back just in time in '95. Nathaniel Keene:
So '97, they closed the church down. I can recall that. At the time I was playing with a gospel
group and my father's mother and his sister was at the hall over there selling food for the raise
for the church. And they left me in here, and she told me, she said, "You're going to have to
take up funds for the church and blah, blah, blah. Because we're over here in the hall."
And I got thinking about that for a good while. And I said to myself, I said, "You know what,
I'm the only one left in here, the Keene." Nathaniel Keene:
And so it hit me, that I got to do this because I'm the one left in here. So I got the funds
together and took it to them later on that afternoon. And it wasn't too long after that,
the place closed. Nathaniel Keene:
A few years ago we had little tents set up out there and had gatherings just outside the church
here. So we had the mics and I brought my guitar there a couple times and we played
and people got together. Nathaniel Keene:
A lot of the younger people have moved away and a lot of the older people have passed. I've seen a
lot of people come and go through this aisle here and sit up there and been put back there in that
field back there. Yeah, it's a lot of people back there. And of course, in this area, I'm one of
oldest, as far as the Keene's is concerned. Nathaniel Keene:
Because we had the Keene's, we had the Kanes and we had the McCoy's up here and we had the
Lee’s out here and in the back to the right back there, there are Tubman relatives there.
Nathaniel Keene: When I first come home, you could read
what it said on the tombstones. We was trying to get somebody to redo them. Couldn't get it done.
Talking about slavery. My father's mother's father, John Linthicum is buried back there,
straight back to the left. If you go back there to the left, you'll see it's just one grave back
there. There's a head marker. He was a slave. And he went into the military to get his freedom.
Nathaniel Keene: So realizing what he did. I said, "Ah,
so that's how my father's mother got her freedom was by him going into the service at the time."
And the regimen he was in, it was quite a few people from this area, the whole church area.
Nathaniel Keene: What he did once he got out. A lot of his friends,
they went west and they became part of the Buffalo soldiers. I never heard what happened to him after
that. But I did realize, I said, "Wow, it's because of him we got our freedom." I mean,
my father's mother and my father, and of course me, that's how we got our freedom.
Nathaniel Keene: But it wasn't that long ago.
It wasn't that long ago. But yeah, I used to go to the woods when I was a kid. Bicycle first,
then on the mini bike. And I talked with Miss Nona, another member of the committee.
She said her father used to bring wood back and forth through the woods.
I mean, years ago, I mean years, years ago, there was no electricity. There was no bathrooms. And
yes, I can recall cutting wood for the heat or to cook or something like that, or going out in the
woods and getting the straw to put in the pen for the pigs, which we killed every year for meat.
Nathaniel Keene: Years ago it was just
something to do. And, didn't have much? No. I can recall getting a little small block of wood.
So big, and another little small block of wood, getting some soda tops,
nailing them on the sides for wheels, putting a nail here to hold a trailer. Tell myself,
having a little truck and trailer. Happy. Nathaniel Keene:
We used to have games we used to play. We'd have a ball, we'd throw it over the house. They'd call
it Annie Oakley. You'd catch the ball. Then you'd run around and you'd tag somebody. We
used to have another game called midnight. You go up to maybe the side of the church and you count
until you get up to 12 and then you say midnight, then you turn around whoever you can go catch.
They would become the person that had to do that. Nathaniel Keene:
And then we'd had another game. It was a girlie game, but they called it hip scotch. You'd have
all these marks on the ground and you had a piece of stone or a shell and you threw it and you,
you'd do all that so you wouldn't get out, you'd play the games.
Nathaniel Keene: When I was a kid, we used to get a crab
basket and nail it up on the tree and then we'd shoot the ball into it. There was so much little
small stuff to do that we were happy. And here we were just, we were happy. I mean,
to me it was great. That's the big story right there. Yes. It's a lot of history in here.
Renná McKinney: (singing) We’re
going to the laaand and we’ll never grooow oooold ooo we will neveeeer grooow oooold
we will never grow oooold ooo, going to the land and we’ll never grow old *singing fades*