Andrews, Calvin "Cuda"

Chandler was rough for a twelve-year-old boy called Cuda Andrews. Back then they called Chandler, Ocotillo. Like many Black families, Calvin “Cuda” Andrews parents migrated from Oklahoma to Chandler to pick cotton in 1941. Arizona cotton producers offered one dollar more than other cotton growing states. Cotton was indeed “King.” Cuda also picked cotton at age twelve. Along with his two brothers and his three sisters they worked the cotton fields. “There was cotton all over as far as Casa Grande way to Coolidge. When we came, Chandler was a one horse town.” All of his childhood he worked the cotton fields and remembers the dirt roads well. It was the times. He had to pick cotton from sunup to sundown.

Cuda Andrews remembers growing up in Chandler where the Blacks would not be served at the front of business establishments. Blacks had to enter at the side. They could only eat at a place called Arrow drugstore. He recalls that when going to the movies all the Blacks had to sit in the “buzzard’s nest,” as the balcony was called then. Andrews was one of the few Blacks who attended Chandler High School. After graduation, Cuda Andrews left for California but returned to Chandler. It was still a rough place even for an adult. The only jobs that most Blacks could get were on the farms.

“My dad inspired me, says Cuda. “He told me if you don’t work you goin’ steal.”

His father taught him good work ethics. Cotton was still the major cash crop but his love of riding horses back in Oklahoma made him become a cowboy. He heeded the advise of his father and became a cowboy on Sam Bell’s Ranch in Chandler. From then Andrews worked on other ranches and became the “Dashing Cowboy of Chandler.” He became known for his boots and his hat. He was never seen without either. It is said that the Chandler young ladies looked forward to seeing the dashing cowboy coming down the dirt roads on his horse “Star.”

“Some changes came to Chandler after the developers started coming to build houses,” says Cuda. “Now that I see all the changes I want to tell these young Blacks coming up to get more education, get better. It is hard to get through to some of them, but that is what I want to tell them.” Wise words indeed from a man who spent his childhood picking cotton!