Interview with Brother Harrison Mayes, 1977

This is a documentary recording by Eleanor Dickinson of Brother Henry Harrison Mayes, the folk-art sign-maker and lay preacher from Middlesboro, Kentucky, near the Cumberland Gap.

The recordings are part of Eleanor Dickinson’s Pentecostal Videotape and Audiotape Collection and were made public through the Smithsonian Online Virtual Archives.

Chapters

• Introduction & Background — Narrator introduces Brother Harrison Mayes as a folk-art sign-maker and lay preacher from Middlesboro, Kentucky, who began writing religious messages on mine walls as a young man. 1:34
• The Cross-Shaped House — Brother Mayes describes the design and symbolism of his cross-shaped home: 12 corner posts for the apostles, a chain of 33 links for Christ’s years on earth, and a heart centerpiece. 2:51
• His Philosophy: Religion, Politics & One Race — Mayes shares his universal worldview — embracing the good in all religions, political parties, and races, and advocating for a single global language and nation. 7:00
• The Gate & “Jesus Save Me” Lock — He explains the walkway entrance to his home with a special lock that required visitors to say “Jesus, save me” aloud before a recording device would allow entry. 10:11
• Rooms of the Cross-House Explained — Detailed walkthrough of the house’s symbolism: 12 front windows for the apostles, 10 back windows for the commandments, 8 rooms for those saved in the ark. 12:31
• The Mine Accident & Divine Vision — Mayes recounts being crushed by a coal cart in the 1930s, given hours to live, and receiving a miraculous recovery — during which he had his vision of erecting large religious signs. 14:10
• The Airport Signs — He describes placing “Prepare to Meet God” signs near 24 major airfields and the controversy they caused among frightened passengers. 17:33
• Concrete Signs for Eternity — Mayes explains his project of 200 permanent concrete signs, each weighing 1,400 lbs, assigned to planets, the poles, seas, and state capitals — cut short by a stroke. 19:51
• The Whiskey Bottle Missionary Packages — He shows how he fills whiskey bottles with small religious signs, corked to survive saltwater, and mails them in packages of 12 to missionaries worldwide via the Church of God directory. 24:58
• The Decorated Bicycle — Mayes presents his sign-covered bicycle, which he rides in Christmas parades, and expresses his wish to one day ride it in outer space. 28:38
• Dealing with Landowners & Human Psychology — He tells humorous and resourceful stories of how he placed signs on others’ land without permission, using wit and “human psychology” to avoid being removed. 29:53
• Family Legacy Across Continents & Planets — Mayes reveals he has assigned each of his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren a continent or planet to continue his sign work after he is gone. 36:20
• The Walking Stick & 259 Denominations — He shows a jacket with 259 crosses representing all chartered US church denominations and discusses the divisions of Christianity with a vial of mixed animal odors as metaphor. 41:06
• The “Museum” of Vices — Mayes walks through his private collection of drugs, pornography, and gambling items assembled to educate preachers and key leaders about moral dangers in society. 47:40
• Closing Reflection: Moses & Outer Space — He draws a parallel between his life and Moses’s three 40-year phases, hopes to live to 120, and envisions signs eventually placed on other planets when space travel becomes possible. 54:23

Background

Brother Henry Harrison Mayes has lived and worked in the Cumberland Gap area, which crosses from Kentucky into Tennessee, since 1896. As a young man working in the coal mines to support himself and his 15-year-old bride, he began writing religious messages on the mine walls with slate. In the 1930s, he was fatally injured in the mine by a coal car and had a vision of huge religious signs across the United States. When by a miracle he recovered, he felt that God had spared his life to erect these large signs on the highways. In the half-century since then, Brother Mayes has built, painted, carved, trucked, and erected these signs in every continental state and many foreign countries through missionaries.

His home in Middlesboro is his largest sign. It is built in the shape of a cross, with “Jesus Saves” painted on the roof for the benefit of any airline passengers flying over. He built the house himself with a religious meaning for every part of it — even making each brick himself in a special mold that indented a cross in each brick. And “Jesus Saves” over every doorway.

Brother Mayes Speaks — The House

Brother Mayes: All right. I want to talk about when I began to get around to building this house. This is the way — I bought the land in the shape of a square, a carpenter’s square to begin with. So it would mean everything. And I managed to get 12 corner posts with the gate posts and everything, to represent the 12 apostles, and so on and so on. And I left one of them — I crooked one of the posts, I didn’t want nothing right about it. And I swung a gate to it in the back end. And every time I needed a brush cleaned, I’d swipe that brush against it, because Judas is no good — Judas, no way you fix it. And I had to have it that way to make the thing plan out right, to be a carpenter’s square. Everything square about it before I even started the house.

So I’ve got the front end of five lots, the back end of three, back end of five, and the front end of three 25-foot lots to make a square. Now, this heart right here — that chain that’s around it has got 33 lengths in it. That represents the 33 years that Jesus stayed on earth. And the principles of Jesus is inside that — which we’ll let this down and explain a little bit about when you’ve got this here. Now, tell the boy to come out here.

Okay. What about this heart right here? I had one on the other side, one on this side, which means everything. If you don’t have your heart in these things, the cross don’t mean anything. I want everything else left like it is outside, to represent the cross of Jesus. I meant everything to mean something. Lay this down. Oh, just this one. Easy. Are you ready?

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Now, the world may not like this, but this is the principles of Jesus himself. And that chain represents 33 years as he stayed here, and that holds the thing together. All right.

Pertaining to religion — Catholic, Protestant, Jew. What I mean by that is this: the good that’s about any of them, I’m in for that. That that ain’t good, I’m not for it. So that’s Jesus himself. My politics — Democrat, Republican, Communist. The good that’s about either one of them, I’m into that.

The third one — languages. I think everybody should strive to have one language so we could understand one another better. Not be a-fussing over things we don’t understand. It wouldn’t take but a little while if every nation put themselves to it, till we could all become one language, regardless of what it took — English or what.

And I believe in one nation — not have hundreds of them where we’re all the time fussing over inches of land, wars, and everything. If somebody takes an inch from an American, they’ve got a war on their hands, a fight on their hands — and so is everybody else. They’re not going to have their land taken without a fight.

And I believe in one race. Get me now. While this is taking place, there’d be a lot of unrest. But when it was over, race prejudices would be away from this earth — white, the colored, the yellow, all blended in one race — because we’re all God’s people. And I’m no better than the colored man. I’m no better than the yellow man, the Chinese — nothing. We’re all God’s race. So, like it or not, that’s the principles of Jesus.

So we will close it back up. I’ll put the chain up. Come on. Wait.

The Walkway and the Gate

I had a walkway here coming in from the highway. You could either come this way or the other way. But if you come this way, you had to walk up to this thing here and notice: “Open to God your heart, and say: Jesus, save me.” And it had to be tuned to a little phonograph in there. When you said that, it recorded on that little old phonograph I had in there, and then you could undo it. But you had to say, “Jesus, save me.” If you didn’t, you didn’t get in.

The Shape of the House

Interviewer: Can you tell me about the house — the shape and all that?

Brother Mayes: It’s made like a cross. The room that you’re standing by now is the living room — that’s the top part of the cross. And then the wings here are the two bedrooms. You want me to tell everybody?

Interviewer: Mm-hm. Yeah, go ahead.

Brother Mayes: I guess you understand it better. Well, this cross represents the cross of Jesus Christ — the house does. It’s got eight rooms in it, 13 foot 4 inches square each one of them. The front part of it here represents the grace plan. We got 12 windows in this front end — represents the trail of apostles. The back end has got 10 windows — represents the Ten Commandments — and the back end represents the law. So I tried to make it mean everything. Each one of these rooms right here on the front’s got two doors. If you get in the work of the Lord and don’t live right, you just get out the other door, as far as the Lord is concerned.

Interviewer: Now, what are the eight rooms for? What does eight stand for?

Brother Mayes: Oh, that represents the eight people saved in the ark.

Interviewer: I see. Yeah. And what about the shape of the lot?

Brother Mayes: This is like a cross. Yes. That’s 88 feet long the long way, and 43 this way.

Interviewer: You built it yourself?

Brother Mayes: I made all the blocks, made them, and done everything there was to do.

Interviewer: When did you make it?

Brother Mayes: About 28 or 30 years ago. I was making signs when I got hurt.

The Mine Accident

Interviewer: What happened?

Brother Mayes: Well, I began when I was 19, making signs. I got hurt about the 30s. What happened? I got squeezed in the mine cart — in here, probably in the rib — in the car. I don’t know whether the public could know what the rib is anyway — where the mine goes in there, and it just spread me out. I’ve never been aware of something.

Interviewer: Did you pray over him? That’s whenever he was — when they brought him out of the mine?

Sister Mayes: Oh yeah. And they took him to the hospital and they just gave him from 48 to 64 hours to live. And he laid unconscious from Friday till Sunday night. And that’s when the little church prayed through and got the victory that he wasn’t going to die. He said he seen these large signs — that’s where he vowed that if the Lord would let him live, he’d put them up.

Interviewer: Was it like a vision?

Sister Mayes: Yes. I guess it was — this lady of the little church — little church on the holler — was praying. Lots of churches all over town was praying. But yet this little church, this little lady, got a vision from the Lord that he wasn’t going to die. He was going to get well.

And the doctor come in that night and he told me — take care of myself — that he couldn’t live. He was smashed to death, and all the means they had in their hospital wouldn’t keep him alive. So he told the nurse to watch him close. He didn’t think he’d make it till midnight. At 10:00 that night, that little church got through with the Lord that he was going to live. At that hour, he woke up and asked me where we were at. He knew from that on.

So the doctor come in next morning, asked the nurse, “Did he make it? Said he didn’t think he’d make it till midnight.” She says, “There’s a miracle performed. He’s talking and he knows everything.” So we just have to say it was the Lord, because they had done all they could do.

Interviewer: How did they get the message at the church?

Sister Mayes: Well, this little lady was praying and she got a vision. She said the Lord showed her — she just got up and told them what the Lord showed her, that he gave her a vision and he wasn’t going to die. Said she seen through the spirit — she seen an angel standing by the bed, and the Lord spoke to her and told her, says, “Tell him he ain’t going to die. He’s going to live and work for the Lord.” So he did. He’s still here and we still honor the Lord first.

Interviewer: Did he have this vision of the signs — as a picture?

Sister Mayes: Yeah. He said — the second motor — the first motor, I mean — the motor pulled off and hit him, and then it was coming back a second time. He said that’s when he seen the large signs, and he said, “If you spare me, I’ll put them up.”

The Signs and the Airports

Interviewer: So what about the messages on the signs?

Brother Mayes: I’ve done put up signs. Well, it says “Jesus Saves,” “Prepare to Meet God.” Otherwise it’s something to try to get people to think of eternity and try to get right with the Lord.

Interviewer: Now, that’s just — what he means — when he put those signs up by the airports, was he trying to scare people?

Sister Mayes: No, he’s trying to get the people that was riding the airplane to see the message, that they ought to get right with the Lord. There were about 24 of them around 24 major airfields over the years, but they don’t let them stay too much because it disturbs their passengers, they say.

Well, he don’t mean to scare them.

Interviewer: What did they say?

Sister Mayes: Just what they say. But anyway — if they say “Prepare to Meet God” as you take off, that scares people.

Interviewer: Any fool long? He don’t look at that way. But they do. Wouldn’t you?

Brother Mayes: He just wants to — well, he had a sign up going up to Harlem, you know, and they thought there was something wrong. Afraid — just turned around and came back. He don’t mean it that way, but a lot of people takes it that way. He just wants to tell them: get right with the Lord, regardless of where they’re at.

Scared religion ain’t worth nothing. I had four signs at the airport down at Knoxville. Well, the man that let me put them on his place said, “They’re just calling out here, telling me that the passengers coming in here are fussing about things at the end of the runway down there, scaring people.” I’m not scaring people. I’m just reminding them to get right with the Lord at the right place. I know what to put, where to put them. I’ve got directions on all of them — just what to do with them. I don’t mean to hurt nobody, trespassing, nothing.

The Concrete Signs

Interviewer: How about the concrete ones? How did you make the concrete ones?

Brother Mayes: Well, you can’t move them much. I’ve had two — I don’t know — oh, by hand. Oh yeah. Dig a hole down in the ground. Pour — put my steel in there. Fit it up to there, and put that form on there. I’ve got a wood form — the bottom part, piece top. Fill that, then put the other one up till I get it up to the top. And then when they dry — a day or two — I’ll take that off, and the letters are already formed in there.

Got around to making these concrete signs to last forever. I intended to make 200 — four of them around each state capital, and one for each to stay in the state. When the 1990s come, three of them are to be taken to the place designated. It’s cut on the backside where they go — whether it’s a planet or whether it’s a nation.

This one right here, this third one, belongs to the planet Jupiter. That right out there belongs to the planet Venus. This one right here belongs to the Moon — and so on and so on.

I intended to make 200, but since this stroke I’ve had, well, that’s cut me short. I’ve got about 125 of them made and up, but I’m finished, I guess, as far as making them is concerned. And I had a little mishap with some of these, because I made some during the war, and there was a priority on the proper kind of steel. And some of them has busted and cracked on me, due to having too big a steel that I couldn’t get the proper kind. But anyway, we have to do as we can when a war is on. So if ever I get to where I can, I’ll finish out the 200.

Nine for the nine planets, one for the Moon, one for each of the 50 states, one for each of the seven seas. Why? Just figure it out for yourself. We’ll be traveling the bottoms of the sea just like where the highway is — one of these days. And I want you to be in the bottom of the sea. Pop up right. That’s all.

And so on and so on. I’ve got one made for the North Pole, one for the South Pole, one for the bank of the Suez Canal, one for the Panama — in the 200. But just like I say, I got cut short, and I’ve got about 80 of them up, I guess. And they weigh 1,400 pounds apiece.

This fourth and fifth right here, they got propped up. There’s a lady here to take them and put them in the art museum in Washington, D.C. This first and the fourth one belongs to Japan.

Missionary Packages

I’m going to try to send off 50 packages this year — that’s 50 dozen, 50 times 12 of them — around the rim of the United States, and the rest to the missionaries. This year’s batch goes to Jerusalem. Missionary in Jerusalem.

This is what you’ve got to put on them. They’ve got to know what’s on there — everything as to its purpose, the value, why it’s valuable. This one says right here — that’s the name of the missionary. “Abandoned. Don’t send it back.” On the other side over here: “12 religious signs, a gift, no value.” That’s to keep the missionary from paying duty on them. See? He takes them out instead of putting a wall-size sign up on his church. He takes these out at his convenience — him or some of the church folks — around the river, ocean, or lake, whatever’s around there. Twelve of them. Don’t send them back.

Interviewer: How do you know the missionary?

Brother Mayes: About 40 of these will go this year. We’ve got a Church of God book — I should have brought it — a magazine, and it gives the pastors’ names and the state overseers of these places, all the missionaries all over the earth, and their families’ addresses. All I’ve got to do is look at this Church of God directory. They send us one every year. See, we keep up with the missionaries that way. So we mail them to the missionaries. See, I belong to Church of God — the headquarters is in Cleveland, Tennessee. I should have brought it out here and showed you what I’m talking about. And they’ve got missionaries all over the place, in all the foreign countries and stuff.

The Whiskey Bottles

Interviewer: Now, what are you doing? Is this how you make them?

Brother Mayes: Now, this is what he was going to show you — how he gets — oh, he gets little boys to pick them up for him. Some men bring them as gifts.

Interviewer: But are they all whiskey bottles?

Brother Mayes: Yeah, yeah. It’s plain old whiskey bottles. Here’s the way it goes. Do you have enough whiskey bottles?

Interviewer: I’m having a tough time getting them now. Are people drinking less?

Brother Mayes: No. There’s bootleggers gathering them up for doing something. I can’t get them hardly. I called a courthouse down here — they took 42 off a man the other day. Oh, you were here for that. Tell them to save them for me when they poured it out. Here’s the way it works.

(demonstration)

You run this thing right around in there and straighten it out. See, that’s 14 land ridges there. I’ve got the courthouse down there watching for them — when they take some off of people, saving them for it.

Right here is a sorting department. Right here is the pints. Half a pint when I can get them. You’ve got to have glass to put these in, and put a cork in there, because the salt water will eat — will ruin these little old plastic caps. But you put a cork in there, it won’t.

I’ve got one package in there of half a pint that has to go 10,000 miles — Fiji Islands. Really? Gilbert Islands, by way of Fiji. Yeah.

(long pause)

I am sorry that I’ve got but one life to give for this — but that’s all. I can’t do what I can’t.

The Bicycle

I’ve got two bicycles — one that I work with, my workhorse. But this is the one I ride in Christmas parades, where they have all kinds of festivals, parades, and so on, for thousands upon thousands of people. And I’ve got other signs to put on here — about 3 foot by 2 foot — that I had on here on the sides and on the front and everything. In other words, I’ve got a lot of things on this bicycle I want people to know. So I keep this — I want to ride this in outer space if I possibly can, sometime.

Putting Up Signs — Conflicts and Human Psychology

Now, all this sign work is not heaven on earth, because you’ve got the highway with your people. You’ve got the landowner in your way, and if you put any of them up, you have to get in the rightaway place, put them up, trespass and do it — and get out of it some way or another.

And I can look at a man and tell just about what he’s aiming to say to me. One man was threatening to run me out of the county and make me take the sign down that I’d worked a whole day to put up — half a day. All right, it was raining. I had already paid him some money for it. And I had my jacket — I just laid down in the grass and went like I was having a heart attack. He told my buddy, said I better not say no more because I’m causing him to have a heart attack. So he let me get away with it.

I know what was happening right there. In other words, the Lord just gave me — he didn’t care nothing about signs, and I couldn’t have scared him by telling him the Lord will get after you. I had to use human psychology.

Another time, a man rolled up behind me — said he owned a little piece of land there. I was up there putting it up all the way. “What are you guys doing?” This hateful. I was up on the top of the sign. I looked around — got a big heavy man down there — and I said: I was about to say, “Trespassing — don’t you know you can get in trouble with trespassing?” — but it just came to me. I said, “No sir. Nothing else in this world will matter. Everything that can happen has already happened.” It just melted him. Not because I said it, but the Lord had the thing in it. He said, “Why?” And he asked, “You don’t know it?” “Yes, I do.” I said, “Now, nine times out of ten, if I ask people, they’ll cuss me out, run me off, put a dog on me or something. And I don’t put up with it. Because I’m just going to find that rightaway place and put them up where they won’t be hurting nobody. Put them up and trust them to stay there.”

Another man — last time I put a sign up — I thought I was getting it on the right-of-way of a little old strip, about 12 foot wide, about 300 foot of it, right the other side of the road on a bluff over here. Well, I got it up, and my buddy took the tools back up to the truck — all but the post digger — and I seen this man’s reaction. Well, I couldn’t really work much for this arthritis anyway. And I said, “Right now is the time to use human psychology, because he sees what I’m doing here. He cared nothing about the Lord.”

Well, I had my strategy on my side. I got all tuned up. I got a hold of that post digger and went walking just like I couldn’t get one foot before the other. I couldn’t hold it — but I put it on. I got up about 100 foot, with my countenance fallen, as if to say: instead of me whooping this fellow, he needs somebody to pity him.

When I went up, went around, I didn’t pay no attention to him. He come around. I said, “Hey — trespassing — you’re trespassing on me.” Jerked out my pocketbook and I said I thought it was — “Is that yours?” “Thank you.” “No, that’s mine.” I said, “Well, let me pay you for it.” “I want no pay.” “Is it raining?” “Yes.” Said, “Well, tell you what — just leave it there, and when it quits raining, just push it off over the hill.” “No, I don’t want to do that.” He’s cooling off, you know. I said, “Tell you what, dude — just leave it there. Call some of these creatures around here, tell them to come get it and take it and put it around your church house. Don’t waste that sign — it cost me $21 besides the work.” And he said, “No, just leave it alone as of now.”

And dozens and dozens of things just like that. And the Lord has endowed me with some kind of a something to get out of it. And right now, because the man’s ready to shoot me or whoop me — I’d better close right there before the highway man comes after me again.

Brother Mayes: So that’s it. If you’ll — I’ll give you two or three of these planks and you can roll them up in a little roll, take them, and get some of your friends to let you tack them on the side of a barn. I know you wouldn’t try to put them on the highway, because it’s a problem.

Sister Mayes: Well, they’re easy to put up if somebody gives you the opportunity to nail one up somewhere. But I can’t do like Daddy. If I was putting one up, I’d ask the people, “Do you want it?”

Brother Mayes: She wouldn’t put none up either.

Interviewer: You just put them up whether they like it or not.

Brother Mayes: I’m just like the apostles. If I’m going to get any up, I’ve got to trespass and do it. Everything they done, they trespassed.

Interviewer: Are you sorry?

Brother Mayes: Sorry? No. The Lord’s got me doing this, and I don’t care who knows it, and there’s nobody can stop me but that. If you had to do it over again, would you do any kind of different signs, or would you be a preacher? She said, “If you had to do it over, would you be a preacher or would you do more signs?” No — I can’t do nothing but this. I’ve tried everything. I had a sound system, a little church house, everything. I can’t do nothing but this — but I can do this.

Naming the Family After Continents and Planets

Now, here’s my children. It’s named after the continents that will get these signs of the continents, like I am doing on Earth.

• James — that’s the oldest boy of mine — South America. He’s to get signs of some sort in South America, just like I’m doing, after I leave here.
• Clyde — Europe — that’s my baby boy.
• May — one of my grandsons — Africa.
• Collie — that’s another grandson — West Indies.
• Billy Ray — North America.
• Jimmy Seals — Australia.
• Raymond Seals — East Indies.
• Carl Seals — Asia.

Now, down here — the planets — if transportation’s available. I’ve got them named after them anyway, to get some kind of a sign up there when transportation’s available.

• Jamie — that’s a grandson — Saturn
• Ricky — Mercury
• Jeff Mays — Uranus
• David Seals — Mars
• June Seals — Venus
• Charles Seals — Pluto
• Ronnie Seals — Jupiter
• (uncertain name) — Stevie — Nebula — that’s a great grandson — Planet X (also called Planet XL)

They call it Planet X. Now, names don’t kill them — they live. Now, in other words, they know that I want them to do that, whether they do it or not.

Interviewer: Did you let them pick which planet they wanted?

Brother Mayes: Oh, no. He just laid it out himself. I didn’t let these granddaughters get by either. One of these daughters-in-law is to do everything she can to do away with nudist trade. Yes. Then do everything she can to do away with pornography. See? That’s what I mean — work at it. Get a hold of the Lord and do what they can for it.

Teaching the Bible

Right here it is, if you can get it down at the bottom. I taught my children the Bible as much as I’ve taught them to be honest, to be decent, to be upright. As my mother used to tell me: “If you borrow one spoonful of salt, pay it back.” So I think that’s the best keynote to the Bible. If we’ll just keep the Ten Commandments. See, if we will keep the Ten Commandments, we’ll do a lot of good.

The Jacket with 259 Crosses

I tell you what — I’ve got a walking stick. I’m going to just say this. I want to show you this walking stick. And you don’t have to even look at it if you don’t want to. Now here we go.

And I want everybody to particularly pay attention to what I’m saying, because this is very, very particular. On this jacket is 259 crosses, which represents the 259 chartered churches that the United States has — plus those that don’t have any charter. All right. Each one of these crosses represents a chartered church. All right. They’re all doing good, and I’m working through all of them and I respect all of them.

But when I got this jacket — this is a barber’s jacket — I went down to the barber and I framed up 12 barefaced lies to get this jacket, to put it on. Because in the first place, the Lord didn’t give us any right to do all these things — we just do it ourselves, and we’re human, and he lets us get by with it. They’re all doing good because we’re human, and the Lord has to work with us as humans — that’s all he’s got to work with.

All right. I’m working through all of them and I respect all of them. And I tried to come up with a thing — now this, in the eyes of educated people, society, or whatever you want to call it — it looks bad. They’ll say if they care at all, it looks like nothing people, all divided up that way. But like I say, we’re human, and we have to look at it that way.

Well, I decided to come up with something in the eyes of society. Now, all this mess of denominations — 700 of them — all of them together, but 259 have got a charter for it in the United States. I tried to come up with something that had an odor that could equal it anyway. So I went down to the dog patch where these animals are, told that man to get me 12 little vials of animal litter, and I put them all in one vial. Now, if you don’t believe there’s an odor in there, you just open that vial top. But there’s nothing on earth stinks any worse than this mess that we’re all divided on. However, we are human and we have to be looked at — the Lord can’t hold it against us, because he made us, and that’s all he’s got to work with — just us human people on this earth.

One of them says, “Humanly speaking, this is to be expected.” On the other hand, “Humanly speaking, this would gag any gut wagon on earth.”

Now, I hope the public has got this.

The Museum

All right. I want to say something in regard to this museum that I’ve had 40 years — gathering stuff from everywhere in the world, both good and bad: lectures, preachers, lawmen, key people.

On this door here, it says: “Hub Nub Theological Seminary for Key People.” I wouldn’t let everybody come in here and see this stuff — roughnecks and stuff. But I’ve done this to help the leading people of the country to stop these things.

On this shelf right here — the road to hell up there, the road to heaven. There’s all kinds of sacred things that I can get a hold of, such as sacrament wine. And there’s about five or six different versions of the Bible — the one the Catholics use, that’s the Douay version; the King James, the English, and so on — all kinds of tracts and things that’s sacred.

Well, this right here has got all kinds of things that I can get a hold of in the way of heroin, marijuana, deer — whiskey, different kinds. I’ve got over behind there a still — marijuana and heroin. The police department down there gave me all this stuff for this purpose. Every time a preacher comes around, I bring him in and show him. “Now, preacher — if this stuff ain’t stopped, the Lord’s going to stop all of us, because we just are getting too far with everything.”

Now here’s a slot machine right here — a penny slot machine. I told this before in another story. A man came in here from Masontown, New Jersey — was at a meeting here and stayed with me — and he come in here, and I showed him some of this nudist stuff. He said, “That’s where I live.” I said, “Don’t you know that’s up there?” “Don’t know it.” Well, that’s the reason I have preachers lecture on these things — because they hear of these things but they don’t know it. If a preacher went down here to the news stand and bought a Playboy, and the public saw him getting that, they’d accuse him of something. But the stuff I had in those things — a Playboy is a Sunday school card by comparison.

I had this cabinet full of everything — Marilyn Monroe in there — that companies are running day and night, making them for men for these dance halls, dancing parties, where they ain’t got enough women. So they have one of these rubber women. I had one in there — cost me $40. I had $400–$500 worth of literature from everywhere in the world — Denmark, England, and from the rim of the United States, Baltimore, Maryland. And they wasn’t just talking about things. They was showing the beginning and the end.

This marijuana and heroin I’ve got in there — and all this whiskey — me and my wife, when I had this stroke, figured I couldn’t be a-lecturing anymore much. And my wife wouldn’t want to fool with it. So we come in here and poured this whiskey out. But I’ve got the labels.

This is the road to heaven. Right over there, I’ve got a round of depopulating pills — the pill. Now, the American ladies in ’69 took 5,000 tons of this depopulating pill. And each pill weighs a fraction of an ounce. All right, I don’t know what the ratio is now. So I’ve got — I ran that in there. I’ve got the bottle where heroin and matter water come in. I’ve got the scale and the needle that they inject the stuff in with. I’ve got pictures in these magazines here — the whole setup of everything.

Now, I hope I’m raking somebody that needs to be raked. I don’t care nothing about what people think of me, just so I’m saying something that’s good. Up here in Baltimore, Maryland — they’ve got a place up there that they can walk into that abortion place at 10:00 this morning, and they’ll have you ready to leave out of there by evening. Well, now, that’s not right. I don’t care who thinks it, who says it ain’t. It’s not right. That’s plain outright murder, and it should be stopped.

And in this cabinet, I had literature — the worst kind — from Denmark, England, and what have you — about four or five hundred dollars’ worth. And me and my wife come in here — for fear my children and grandchildren get a hold of it — we took them out and burned them up. And but now — get me — this is just plain old hellish stuff, really. But yet, how I say this: for the purpose I had in it, it’s just as sacred as anything, because I had it here to teach preachers and key people that this must be stopped. I bring them in here, one by one, and just lay it out to them.

And all these up here are letters — pro and con — telling me the work is no good, it’s degrading. I got a letter from a state highway patrolman in Mississippi the other day, said, “Your work is just plain old nuisance.” Well, now — that’s just what he thinks. This is sacred work. I’ve been into this sacred work, putting up religious signs and sacred stuff, 58 years now. I hope to live 40 more.

Closing — Moses and Outer Space

Now, get me. I want to say this for a dessert. Moses lived 120 years. I’m not Moses by no means. I’m just plain old twisted Brother Mayes — just got enough sense to know what the Lord wants done.

Moses spent 40 years being raised in Pharaoh’s house, killed a man and had to leave. Spent 40 more years with his father-in-law, over across the mountain. The Lord called him when he was 80. And he spent 40 years bringing the children of Israel out of bondage and over to the promised land — but Joshua took them over, because Moses made a mistake by trying to get a little honor out of striking the rock for water to come out. He didn’t get to go over, but he saw it.

Now, I’ve just about spent — for 80 years — living and getting up to maturity and getting this work going. I’m just almost 80. I hope to retire from this earthly sign work on highways and byways by 80. And I hope — I don’t know — the Lord may be ready for me — but I hope to live 40 more years to spend for outer space.

Something that will do for outer space. Because visible from this earth is 100 million what we call stars, and some of them — Aries is a million times bigger than this earth. Planet Jupiter is 1,318 times bigger than this earth. Every square mile of this earth has got more living individuals than there are people on earth.

Well, why would He make a little thing here with 196,000 square miles in it, with everything on it — and space with nothing on it? Why? I’d do better than that. The Lord has got plenty of these planets — what we call stars — it’s got millions and millions of people on them. However, I don’t know that — but we are going to know it.

Now, I’ve got — just like it’s in some of the others — I’ve got grandsons and great-grandsons and my own children to keep this sign work going on earth, as I’m doing it, when they get around to transportation to the planets — or try to get some kind of a thing up that says “Prepare to Meet God,” because “Get right with God” is all any preacher, Jesus, the apostles, or anybody has ever said. So that’s all I care about.

Get right with God. That’s all it matters. If you preach 100 years, that’s all you say: Get right with God.

[End of main interview. Closing music follows.]

Transcript sourced from captions. Corrected for transcription errors, speaker identification, punctuation, and clarity. Might be inaccurate here and there.