Fred Page was born on a 3,000-acre farm in Louisiana. He lived there for most of his teenage years. He then moved to Mississippi where he has lived for 52 years. Overall, Mr. Page has had a very long and interesting life.
             In Louisiana, Fred's family was one of the most well-off black families of its time. He lived in a great big house and his father worked for many rich people. They raised hogs and cows which was rare for some plantations. When Fred was 12 years old, he was hired to pick cotton. He could pick about a couple hundred pounds of cotton by two o'clock. During the picking, he would hardly see a white person, unless the overseer was white.
             When he moved to Mississippi, he began working at the Melrose Plantation at the age of 18. His owner, Mrs. Kelly was very high cultured. She taught him the rich culture ways like they would use in New York, so he would know how the white people would talk to him. Fred was very sophisticated for a young black teenager. When he started working in the State of Mississippi he wasn't quite used to the way a black person was supposed to speak. "Everyone you talked to is "yas 'em" and no 'em" and "yas 'em" giving that high honor, you know. And I started saying "yes and no", but I soon got out of that. In a couple of weeks I blended back down to "Yas" and "no's'm," that sort of thing." This is very similar to the character Grant in A Lesson Before Dying. Grant was smarter than most of the white people he knew but sometimes had to act dumber to give them pleasure or acted smarter to piss them off.
             He began only giving tours to blacks and everyone gave Fred's tours high reviews. When he started giving tours to whites, they asked Mrs. Kelly if he could handle it and they would say, "I don't want him talking to my children," while Fred stood beside them. Once they allowed him to give the tour, all the children loved him. Years later, many people came up to Fred and said how his tour had s...