Clayton_Bates

Clayton Bates Clayton “Peg Leg” Bates Clayton Bates was born in 1907, in Fountain Inn, South Carolina. As a young boy, he worked in the cotton fields and his mother was a nurse for a white family. Clayton hated his job though, and his true love was dancing. Some days, he would secretly go to the local barber shop and dance for the rich white men for some extra money, until one day when his mother found out and dragged him home. Clayton always went back though, because he loved the extra money, and most of all, he loved to dance. At the age of eleven, Clayton got sick of his job in the cotton fields. He claimed that the job “wasn’t 9 to 5, it was can to cant”. He pleaded with his mother to let him go to work in the cottonseed mill, but she wouldn’t let him because she felt he was too young to be working in a dangerous factory. After enough reasoning his mother agreed to let him go to work in the cottonseed mill, where he worked on top of a cottonseed pile. leg, peg, clayton, bates, mother, even, show, moves, let, job, dance, cottonseed, performed, called, because, after, york, white, traveling, though, performance, perform, new, go, each, day, dancing, dancer, cotton, club, black, young, worked, work, very, times, time, tap, shows, run, right, returned, refused, people, paris, owned, one, now, never