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Angela Schmidt Women Studies 398 Interview with Berneice Westall April 8/9, 1990 TAPE SUMMARY TAPE#/ IDE A 8 3 4 S6 62.. Berneice was born in 1903 in Chicago. Father was in business; had to move to Nebraska for his health. Family got a homestead near Mitchell, Nebraska, where father's brother already had a ranch. Story of arrival, first night, building of the barn. Incident with the coyote: Berneice and mother thought it was a dog. Berneice is about four years old. Building of the house. Detailed description of the one-room-house. In the yard is a cellar. While mother worked on the ranch, father was a butcher in town. Had his slaughterhouse at the Platte River. Incident with the snake: Mother used to put fresh milk in cellar; Berneice licked cream; one day there was a snake; mother killed snake and found out what Berneice had been doing. Incident with the "mask": Mother made a mask to wear in a snowstorm. Detail about homestead legislation: Be on farm for seven years. Houses were on father's brother's ground. Had to be moved over the hill. Drilling of wells on uncle's and father's ranch. Building of tank. Father erects windmill. Incident in town: Berneice trades a nickel's worth of candy for a kitten. Mother comes up with a bird cage to get it home to the ranch. Berneice plays with little chicken in the birdcage. 2.10 Z.36 246 3 j J 314 J6 44-4 4 S6 545 2 Mother's difficulties in new place: She was afraid of the Indians in a reservation north of the farm in the Blackhills. In Chicago she had tended father's office. Stories about social habits. Get-togethers with aunt and cousin on the nearby farm. Detailed description of making taffy, a kind of candy made out of sugar, butter, and vinegar. On mother's education: "went to all school there was" in New Buffalo, Michigan. She knew how to keep books. It was very simple. Incident: A praerie fire threatens the ranches. Mother, aunt, and uncle help together to fight it off. vVomen prepare meal for helpers afterwards. Mother substitutes butter with lard and egg yoke. Description of mother's doing the laundry. Hard work. But women did not complain. Mother had miscarriages; Berneice was only one who carried through. Family moves to town when mother's health gets bad and Berneice needs to go to school. Parents go out to ranch on weekends. Modification in homestead law requires shorter period on land. Description of neighbors' house: It was made of sod. They burnt cow chips in the oven. Incident: Berneice breaks her elbow at square dance at the neighbors' place. She is sick in bed. Mother drives her to doctor in town. Story is interrupted by account of her early experience in school. Berneice started in second grade, because mother had taught her at home. Father sells ranch after the required time on homestead is over. Mother is homesick for New Buffalo, Michigan, where her family lives. Father wants to visit his family in Indiana. That is around 1910. Story about first automobile. Father buys farm near Lake City, Michigan. Family stays there for a year, but father does not like farming. Story about the "ornery cow": Berneice had to drive cattle home in the evenings. Mother and Berneice move to New Buffalo, while father attends barber school in Chicago. After that he has a barber shop in Lake City in a hotel. After one or two years father sells shop and family moves to Bilding, Mich., a working town. Here Berneice has her first three years in high school. Berneice's sicknesses: The child contracts measles. She comes down with the flu and develops pneumonia. Almost dies from it. SJJJE B 3 9 Berneice makes a lifelong friend. Ethel lives with Berneice's family during the week, so she can attend school. 2 I After three years in Bilding, father decides to move to the west again. The family first moves onto the father's brother's farm on Medical Lake, \:Vashington (the uncle had moved there from Nebraska). 31 Family moves to Davenport to live there for one year. Berneice goes to dances and has a wonderful time. Incident with the history test: Berneices friends go dancing, while she is home studying. Berneice is friendly with the boys, but does not date them like they they do it today. + 8 Father makes family move again, this time to Eugene, Oregon. Family has a house near Oregon State University campus. Berneice meets a girl's brother, who caught a little bobcat. I 0 3 After one year family moves to Pullman, where father's brother has a barber shop. He needs a barber. Berneice has problems in school because of movement. She meets a girl's brother, but they drift apart when he leaves for college. I '3 4 Berneice graduates from high school and gets a job in a doctor's office. Description of work. After three years she wants to take classes in college. Reaches an arrangement with doctor so she can take art classes and still work. After two or three years Berneice gets the flu and has to quit classes. J 1 b Family moves to Tecao. Berneice meets a boyfriend. / f f- The following was erased on Berneice Westall's request and was newly recorded on the next day: Berneice married, and after several years got a divorce. She finally moved back to Pullman in 1951. Follows a blank l 6 0 Back to original recording: Berneice Westall sends her girl to school. Moves back to Pullman. Has different jobs on and off campus. Daughter finishes high school, marries, and gets a teaching certificate. Berneice \:Vestall retires for bad health and takes in sewing to augment her social security . .(... <j I Talks about daughter's career: Teacher in El Paso, Texas. Daughter got a divorce. Now she is getting a M.A. in Education. 3 I l Berneice Westall describes her life as an old lady: Health, social life at senior center, cat. 3 0 Comparison of Generations: Mother had no washing machine to do laundry. She got her first one in Tecao. Berneice had a washing machine from the start. Life got easier: All the new machines in offices. But there are problems, too: New cashiers in the supermarket. 330 4 83 4 Story about father's first car. Incident: Father drives over a neighbor's little tree. Story about the wreck with the horse sleigh. Answers to a question: Her young years was the most interesting part of her life. Here we interrupted recording; Berneice Westall was asking me about myself, and I wanted to be polite. I did not record my answers. Family history: Her father's father had come to Michigan City, Indiana, from Germany. On the boat he had met his later wife; she, too, was German. Grandmother taught children how to knit socks. 5 Oj The mother's parents were Germans from Ohio. Her grandmother had lost her mother early and was sent to live with a family in Ohio. She could not go to school. She later married one of the family's boys. This man, Berneice's grandfather, went into business in Cleaveland. He gave up he shoe shop during the 1993 depression. Family moved to Michigan to start farming. Grandmother raised four or five children. TAPE#Z. &ID£ A 4 JO 4 50 30 136 I S3 08 People in the west are different: They care less for appearance. They do not wear gloves to church and call each other with the first name. You make friends quicker. The weather is nicer. there is more acceptance between the races, too. Talks about apartment complex she lives in; about the manager; talks to her cat. Women in the west: work as hard as men and earn half the wages. The following was erased on Mrs. Westall's request Account of daughter's career as a teacher. Story about the little Hispanic boy who needed help in English. Ancestor's origins: They might have come from an area at the border between Germany and France. Father and his brothers were bilingual. Were ridiculed in school for their German background. They Americanized the family name. Berneice Westall would have liked to become an artist, if life would have been different. Daughter does not want to talk to her mother about their lives. She wants her mother to write her life down for her. The following was erased on Berneice Westall's request. The time after Berneice Westall's divorce was very difficult. Women were paid low wages. She told her acquaintances she was a widow. Her daughter has it easier. Half of her classmates 5 are divorced. '+ f The following was erased on Berne ice VVestall 's request. -:tS Talks about a book she is reading: How to talk to your cat. Berneice \Vestall talks about religion: She herself is very religious. Her daughter was brought up this way, too. But her husband had been an atheist. Her daughter is a member of the unitarian church. B.W. compares it to her church, the methodist church. Her father's denomination had been Lutheran. He did not believe in being promiscuous. 3 :L 3 Story of Berneice's conversion. She was twelve years old and went to a evangelist meeting. Afterwards parents joined protestant church. Account of different church memberships. Today friends take her to her methodist church in Pullman. 3 5 t Talks about relationship to Catholics. There is not as much enmity as there used to be between the denominations. Tells about a catholic friend. 4 08 Talks again about her marriage. She had married with 24; marriage had lasted about twelve years. 4 0 46Z The following was erased on B. W. 's request. Berneice Westall would not live her life over again; not in the world as it is now. It is overpopulated. She talks about China and Japan; about abortion. Third World needs birth control. She and her husband used condoms. People thought that was a sin in those days. She did not. After the difficult birth of her daughter she decided not to have another child. In those days people did not talk about sex like they do it today. The following was erased on B. W. 's request. S 2 0 Mother only told her little about sex; she told her daughter only little. She learned about sex through "ignorance". 5 3,:, The rest was erased on B. W. 's request.
Object Description
Rating | |
Title | Westfall, Berneice Oral History Interview, 1990 |
Interviewer | Schmidt, Angela G. |
Date | 1990-04-19 |
Description | 92 minute oral history with Berneice Westfall, conducted for a Women in the West (HST 398) course at Washington State University. Discusses her family often moving around in the east due to financial, health, family and working conditions. Discusses jobs that she had during her life and her opinion of family. |
Subject | Working mothers; Rural women |
Coverage | North and Central America--United States--Washington (State)--Whitman County--Pullman; North and Central America--United States--Illinois--Cook County--Chicago; North and Central America--United States--Nebraska--Scotts Bluff County--Mitchell |
Type | Sound |
Genre | Interviews |
Publisher | Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections, Washington State University Libraries: https://libraries.wsu.edu/masc |
Rights | http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ |
Rights Notes | In copyright. Item is in copyright until 95 years after 2011 publication date. |
Identifier | ua220b06f40 |
Source | Is found in Archives 220, Women in the West Oral Histories https://libraries.wsu.edu/masc/finders/ua220.htm at Washington State University Libraries' Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections (MASC) https://libraries.wsu.edu/masc |
Holding Institution | Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections, Washington State University Libraries |
Contributors | Digitization and description funded through a National Endowment for the Humanities We the People grant for Washington Womens History to the Washington Womens History Consortium, a part of the Washington State Historical Society. |
Language | English |
Digitization | Original audio cassettes were converted to wav files using Audacity and a USBPre interface. Mp3 files were then created from the wav files for online access. Film clips were created as mpeg-4 files using Adobe Premiere Elements 9 to add selected images to the wav audio files, and then converted to flv files for online display. Print documents were scanned to 300dpi pdf format using a Xerox Workcentre 5030 copier/scanner. |
Description
Title | ua220b06f40_Abstract |
Full Text |
Angela Schmidt
Women Studies 398
Interview with Berneice Westall
April 8/9, 1990
TAPE SUMMARY
TAPE#/
IDE A
8
3
4
S6
62..
Berneice was born in 1903 in Chicago. Father was in business; had to move to Nebraska for
his health.
Family got a homestead near Mitchell, Nebraska, where father's brother already had a ranch.
Story of arrival, first night, building of the barn.
Incident with the coyote: Berneice and mother thought it was a dog. Berneice is about four
years old.
Building of the house. Detailed description of the one-room-house. In the yard is a cellar.
While mother worked on the ranch, father was a butcher in town. Had his slaughterhouse
at the Platte River.
Incident with the snake: Mother used to put fresh milk in cellar; Berneice licked cream; one
day there was a snake; mother killed snake and found out what Berneice had been doing.
Incident with the "mask": Mother made a mask to wear in a snowstorm.
Detail about homestead legislation: Be on farm for seven years.
Houses were on father's brother's ground. Had to be moved over the hill.
Drilling of wells on uncle's and father's ranch. Building of tank. Father erects windmill.
Incident in town: Berneice trades a nickel's worth of candy for a kitten. Mother comes
up with a bird cage to get it home to the ranch. Berneice plays with little chicken in the
birdcage.
2.10
Z.36
246
3 j J
314
J6
44-4
4 S6
545
2
Mother's difficulties in new place: She was afraid of the Indians in a reservation north of the
farm in the Blackhills. In Chicago she had tended father's office.
Stories about social habits. Get-togethers with aunt and cousin on the nearby farm. Detailed
description of making taffy, a kind of candy made out of sugar, butter, and vinegar.
On mother's education: "went to all school there was" in New Buffalo, Michigan. She knew
how to keep books. It was very simple.
Incident: A praerie fire threatens the ranches. Mother, aunt, and uncle help together to fight
it off. vVomen prepare meal for helpers afterwards. Mother substitutes butter with lard and
egg yoke.
Description of mother's doing the laundry. Hard work. But women did not complain.
Mother had miscarriages; Berneice was only one who carried through.
Family moves to town when mother's health gets bad and Berneice needs to go to school.
Parents go out to ranch on weekends. Modification in homestead law requires shorter period
on land.
Description of neighbors' house: It was made of sod. They burnt cow chips in the oven.
Incident: Berneice breaks her elbow at square dance at the neighbors' place. She is sick
in bed. Mother drives her to doctor in town. Story is interrupted by account of her early
experience in school. Berneice started in second grade, because mother had taught her at
home.
Father sells ranch after the required time on homestead is over. Mother is homesick for New
Buffalo, Michigan, where her family lives. Father wants to visit his family in Indiana. That
is around 1910.
Story about first automobile.
Father buys farm near Lake City, Michigan. Family stays there for a year, but father does
not like farming. Story about the "ornery cow": Berneice had to drive cattle home in the
evenings. Mother and Berneice move to New Buffalo, while father attends barber school in
Chicago. After that he has a barber shop in Lake City in a hotel. After one or two years
father sells shop and family moves to Bilding, Mich., a working town. Here Berneice has her
first three years in high school.
Berneice's sicknesses: The child contracts measles. She comes down with the flu and develops
pneumonia. Almost dies from it.
SJJJE B
3
9 Berneice makes a lifelong friend. Ethel lives with Berneice's family during the week, so she
can attend school.
2 I After three years in Bilding, father decides to move to the west again. The family first moves
onto the father's brother's farm on Medical Lake, \:Vashington (the uncle had moved there
from Nebraska).
31 Family moves to Davenport to live there for one year. Berneice goes to dances and has a
wonderful time. Incident with the history test: Berneices friends go dancing, while she is
home studying. Berneice is friendly with the boys, but does not date them like they they do
it today.
+ 8 Father makes family move again, this time to Eugene, Oregon. Family has a house near
Oregon State University campus. Berneice meets a girl's brother, who caught a little bobcat.
I 0 3 After one year family moves to Pullman, where father's brother has a barber shop. He needs
a barber. Berneice has problems in school because of movement. She meets a girl's brother,
but they drift apart when he leaves for college.
I '3 4 Berneice graduates from high school and gets a job in a doctor's office. Description of work.
After three years she wants to take classes in college. Reaches an arrangement with doctor
so she can take art classes and still work. After two or three years Berneice gets the flu and
has to quit classes.
J 1 b Family moves to Tecao. Berneice meets a boyfriend.
/ f f- The following was erased on Berneice Westall's request and was newly recorded on the next
day:
Berneice married, and after several years got a divorce. She finally moved back to Pullman
in 1951. Follows a blank
l 6 0 Back to original recording:
Berneice Westall sends her girl to school. Moves back to Pullman. Has different jobs on and
off campus. Daughter finishes
high school, marries, and gets a teaching certificate. Berneice \:Vestall retires for bad
health and takes in sewing to augment her social security .
.(... |
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