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Ann Emerson 3/27/94 interviewed by Jerry M. Scott SIDE ONE Counter 23 55 69 77 94 114 Begin interview Ann was born on May 24, 1924 in Juneau, Alaska and lived on Douglas Island, Alaska which is about 3 miles from Juneau. Her father's name was Albert Royal Edwards, mother's name was Limpi Ilona Aalto-Edwards. Mother was born in Mendocino County, California at Fort Bragg. Grandfather's name was August Aalto and grandmother was Maria Nusella-Aalto, both from Finland and married in the U.S. When Ann's mother was about 5, her family moved to Port Townsend, Washington. They then moved to Alaska during the gold rush. After arriving in Alaska, six more children were born to the family. The family settled on Douglas Island, Alaska. Ann's father was born in Omaha,.Nebraska and went to Alaska as a member of the U.S. Army, stationed at the Fort Chilkoot barracks near Haines, Alaska. The Army went to Douglas during July 4th celebrations and put on plays and shows. One day her father looked out at the audience and saw Ann's mother. He exclaimed, "That's the girl I'll marry!" Ann's father worked in a gold mill at Thane, Alaska about 3 miles from Douglas Island and then at Chichagof Island, Alaska. He later returned to Douglas Island and had a tailor shop. One day his business partner took off with all the money. It was "hard to catch people in those days." My father worked at the Alaska/Juneau gold mine company which was then the second largest low grade ore producing mine in the world. Ann's father was a flotation mill hand and processed the ore. He made the gold bricks - "I guess you could call him a goldbricker!" 135 152 157 171 198 213 229 243 Ann's grandfather worked in the gold mines doing pick and shovel work. There was a strike one year and her grandfather worked as a scab. After the strike, he never worked again at the mine. Ann's grandparents had seven children, and Ann's mother was the oldest. Ann's father was of English-Irish-Welsh Scotch heritage and his name was Orrin Royal Edwards. Ann's mother was Sara Jane Butterfield and may be related to someone of the Butterfield State Lines. Ann's parents had nine children. One daughter, Lola June, died when she was about four of diphtheria. Another male child was stillborn when Ann was about five. Four of the remaining seven children still survive, all are women. The children's names are, (in order of birth) Bernice, Orrin, Phyllis, Glenn, Helen, Ann, and Shirley (born in 1932). Ann started school in 1930 at age six. There were 2 grades together in some classes, and 3 grades together in others. Ann was a good student. Students would often go to the teacher's house for help and the teachers often came to the student's homes for dinner. Ann's siblings were employed in the local movie theater or worked in a store. Some worked in the fish cannery in the summer. The girls did house work and the boys put their name in to work in the mines when they were old enough. Douglas Island is 25 miles around, and about 3 miles across. It was neat, beautiful. There were mountains and Mt. Juneau and Mt. Robert. There was a fierce taku wind that blew 60 to 70 miles per hour in the fall and winter. Ann played baseball alot with the boys. This was not softball, it was hardball. "Baseball was going to be my vocation when I came to the states." Ann wanted to become a professional ball player on a women's team. 2 260 299 326 344 She married instead, "It was a better step, really." Ann quit high-school during the last 1/2 of her junior year. "It was ok to quit at that age- they couldn't do anything about it." Ann worked at the Douglas Island telephone exchange switchboard for $50.00/month which was not very much money- but "it kept me in sandwiches and magazines and puzzle-books," as well as cigarettes and alcohol. Young people drank alot- almost all the kids drank. You could get a cabdriver to buy a bottle. Ann could buy beer at a drugstore and wine at another store. "We availed ourselves of those commodities." We did drink alot. "Alaskans are noted for that!" We could drive 25 miles to the Mendenhall Glacier and 3 miles to Thane. "There was nothing to dothat was a good excuse anyway." Ann remembers that her father got a raise, from 90 cents/hr to $1.00/ hr. There was much rejoicing. Our family was not rich or poor. We had what we needed. We got most of our clothes from Sears. Douglas Island had three beer parlors and three grocery stores. The economy was ok. Alaska was still a territory of the U.S. Ann voted for the first time for Eisenhower. Ann's was a musical family. In her brother's band she played trumpet and accordion. It was lots of fun. Ann's mother collected the school tax by going door to door. The water tank owner also collected his tax by going door to door. Water tax was about $2.25 a month. During the dustbowl of the 1930's, Ann remembers that the Satko family left Oklahoma with a homemade yacht. They launched it in Puget Sound and sailed to Juneau. Everyone got out of school to see them. They settled in Juneau and had lots of kids named such things as Northwind, Southwind, Eastwind ... Ann saw Will Rogers who had flown to Juneau with Wiley Post (who had only one eye) . 3 374 389 398 416 441 450 SIDE TWO 006 Shortly afterwards, Rogers died in a plane wreck. In April, 1937 Ann again got out of school to celebrate the first Airmail to Juneau. Governor Troy was there and they staged a big celebration for the newsreel cameras. Ann got her driver's license when she was 14. She was a writer and once won an Elk's Club contest. She wrote the best paper for Highschool freshmen on the topic, "Why I was proud to be an American." Her paper was the best in Alaska and she won $25.00 and got her name in the paper. On Washington's birthday, Feb. 22, 1936, Ann's parent's house burned down in a large fire that claimed several houses on Douglas Island. The taku wind fanned the flames. Her family moved in with an older sister. Ann worked at the Douglas Ann never touched a fish, was fun to be part of the of the women worked there supplement their income. outside of the home." Fishery Cannery. she made cans. "It work force. Many in the summer to Few of them worked "The men liked the women. Their attitude towards women was ok. The average woman stayed at home and tended to children. They did the washing and waited for the men to come home." Douglas had 600 people on it when I was there. Juneau had about 8000. We rented, didn't buy our homes. After the fire, my father bought [a home] . He borrowed $200 for plywood and paid $20/month to a bank in Juneau. Our homes always had lots of rooms. "We had running water, indoor plumbing, a bathtub, toilet ... lived like we do now." "Before that, when the kids were home, I had very little to do - I probably had it to do, 4 25 80 104 140 173 185 but I didn't do it." We did the dishes as we grew older. My relationship with my mother was not all that great. Our Dad spoiled us. If we wanted money our mother said "NO!" But she was fun and musical too. We did music when we were together. We spent the holidays together and went to the grandparents for dinner. I often spent the holidays in Juneau with a girlfriend. On Christmas eve, the presents were passed out. One day I found out that there was no Santa Claus- it was sad. We didn't teach our children about Santa Claus because that's not the real reason for Christmas, it is the birth of Jesus. We often went on drives with Dad. Dad had a model A which was the first truck in Juneau. He bought it second-hand. To get it to Douglas Island, we had to wait until the tide goes out and then with planks and rocks, drive it across the bar to Douglas Island. Dad had a model T also. It was still on Douglas Island in 1944 when Dad died. We had to back the model A up steep 'hills because the gas didn't work right. The boys would sneak out and drive Dad's car when Dad was at work and it wasn't his turn to drive. In 1937, a bridge was built connecting Douglas Island and Juneau. My sister was the bridge queen. An uncle of mine from the states worked as an engineer on the bridge. A girlfriend and I were the first to walk across the bridge. The Daily Alaska Empire newspaper headline read, "Douglas Tomboys Cross Bridge." There was no more bringing cars across the bar. Sometimes we cooked our own breakfast. Sometimes our Dad cooked his favorite, oatmeal. When Dad was on the right shift/ he cooked oatmeal for our school lunch. We didn't have a hot lunch program then. I learned from my father how to make stew and how to make meatloaf. These were my two kitchen capers when I got married. 5 199 214 237 251 265 271 299 I was going to be a school teacher. I hoped to teach physical education and English, but I did neither of those. There were five girls that I ran around with. We are still the best of friends. We had dates with boys- we would go walking or to dances. The war came. December 7, 1941. It was a scary thing. I was working at the switchboard when the Juneau FBI man called the Douglas Island FBI man (who lived next door to us) and said that Pearl Harbor had been bombed. "And I was listening in, you know- we just listened when the FBI talked, it was never anything important- until now!" There were blackouts at night and air-raid drills. On June 13, 1943, I set sail for the states with my sister and her daughter. The ship was blacked out. "Of course, I smoked." "You never knew from the rumors when the Japanese people were coming. Our nerves were frayed." We rode the steamship "Northstar" to Wrangle, Petersburg (an Aunt of mine lived there who taught school), and Ketchikan (the largest port). "Seattle was huge!" One of my sisters lived in Tacoma and her husband worked in the foundry during the war. The first thing I did when I got to the states was help my sister can cherries. And I saw trains. We had no need for trains in Juneau. During the war, many of us drank. We could get into beer parlors. Police women were sent out because of the war, Mrs. Hartung was her name. Bartenders kept an eye out for her. We made fun of her. We would run out the back door when she came. I often went with my 28 year old sister when I was 17. I moved to Seattle and baby sat. We were called nurse maids or nurse girl. "I baby sat for a women whose husband was in the Navy and was gone. One night she had a date with a sailor, a coast guard guy. That was 6 329 363 368 375 392 423 common. Women would go out when their husbands were gone." The next night, he showed up with a friend for me. It was love at first sight. We were married April 18, 1944 in Seattle. My husband's name is James Alton Emerson. My husband worked on the Coast Guard cutter "Haida, 11 named after the Haida Indians. He was out to sea for 28 days and home for 5. He transferred to a Seattle warehouse. We had our first child in 1946. We moved to Albion, Washington in 1946. I had eight children. Michael, Patrick, James Jr., Peggy Ann, twins Kevin and Karen, David, and Dawn, born 12 years after David. She is now 23 years old, the oldest is 47. All of the children live in the area. We have 36 grandchildren- some are step grandchildren and we are all fairly close. Kevin was recently elected to the Albion town council by 2 votes. Most of the family attend the local church. I mostly did not work out of the home. Oh- I sorted peas in Colfax one year for a couple of months. I worked for one year while my husband's foot was in bad shape. I worked at a laundry in Pullman. I started to work at WSU but I got sick and had to quit. I was happier at home anyway- being more or less my own boss, being here when the kids came home. Cooking, I never much cared for cooking, but I did it. The WORST possible thing that can happen to me is to make me do the dishes. I just don't even like it. Now I do the dishes every couple of days. "That's a fact and I don't even care who knows it." I hated it when the kids left home. I cried. But I got over it. In 1991, the last one got married. They lived in an old church. Her husband was strangled accidently and it was very upsetting for the entire family. It was the family's biggest tragedy. My husband's family were founders of this area. [Albion]. His mother was a Kenoyer, 7 430 who were professional people. His mom was the postmaster at Albion for many years. During the war, I was a welder at the Todd shipyard in Seattle. I had a radio show on KBKH in 1951. I sang every other week opposite the Treble Triad of Pullman High-school. I now write the GuyAlbion Historical Society's newsletter every four months. I belonged to the Albion Women's club. My children were in little league. My husband was a farm laborer, but in 1953 he began at WSU as a stationary steam engineer. He worked there for 23 years. He is now an administrator at the Moose lodge in Pullman and I help out. Albion had about 230 people 1n it in 1946. It now has about 632 people. END OF TAPE AND INTERVIEW. 8
Object Description
Rating | |
Title | Emerson, Ann Edwards Oral History Interview, 1994 |
Interviewer | Scott, Jerry M. |
Date | 1994-03-27 |
Description | 61 minute oral history with Ann Edwards Emerson, conducted for a Women in the West (HST 398) course at Washington State University. She talks about her early childhood on Douglas Island, Alaska, the relationship she had with her father, and the various jobs she held in the Juneau area. She moved to the states in 1943, and describes her job as a babysitter and the Seattle nightlife during the 1940s. She married her husband in 1944 and moved to Albion, Washington where she stayed and raised eight children. All of her children are married. |
Subject | Rural women; Housewives; Travel |
Coverage | North and Central America--United States--Alaska--Juneau division--Juneau; North and Central America--United States--Washington (State)--King County--Seattle; North and Central America--United States--Washington (State)--Whitman County--Albion |
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 | ua220b10f72 |
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 | ua220b10f72_Abstract |
Full Text | Ann Emerson 3/27/94 interviewed by Jerry M. Scott SIDE ONE Counter 23 55 69 77 94 114 Begin interview Ann was born on May 24, 1924 in Juneau, Alaska and lived on Douglas Island, Alaska which is about 3 miles from Juneau. Her father's name was Albert Royal Edwards, mother's name was Limpi Ilona Aalto-Edwards. Mother was born in Mendocino County, California at Fort Bragg. Grandfather's name was August Aalto and grandmother was Maria Nusella-Aalto, both from Finland and married in the U.S. When Ann's mother was about 5, her family moved to Port Townsend, Washington. They then moved to Alaska during the gold rush. After arriving in Alaska, six more children were born to the family. The family settled on Douglas Island, Alaska. Ann's father was born in Omaha,.Nebraska and went to Alaska as a member of the U.S. Army, stationed at the Fort Chilkoot barracks near Haines, Alaska. The Army went to Douglas during July 4th celebrations and put on plays and shows. One day her father looked out at the audience and saw Ann's mother. He exclaimed, "That's the girl I'll marry!" Ann's father worked in a gold mill at Thane, Alaska about 3 miles from Douglas Island and then at Chichagof Island, Alaska. He later returned to Douglas Island and had a tailor shop. One day his business partner took off with all the money. It was "hard to catch people in those days." My father worked at the Alaska/Juneau gold mine company which was then the second largest low grade ore producing mine in the world. Ann's father was a flotation mill hand and processed the ore. He made the gold bricks - "I guess you could call him a goldbricker!" 135 152 157 171 198 213 229 243 Ann's grandfather worked in the gold mines doing pick and shovel work. There was a strike one year and her grandfather worked as a scab. After the strike, he never worked again at the mine. Ann's grandparents had seven children, and Ann's mother was the oldest. Ann's father was of English-Irish-Welsh Scotch heritage and his name was Orrin Royal Edwards. Ann's mother was Sara Jane Butterfield and may be related to someone of the Butterfield State Lines. Ann's parents had nine children. One daughter, Lola June, died when she was about four of diphtheria. Another male child was stillborn when Ann was about five. Four of the remaining seven children still survive, all are women. The children's names are, (in order of birth) Bernice, Orrin, Phyllis, Glenn, Helen, Ann, and Shirley (born in 1932). Ann started school in 1930 at age six. There were 2 grades together in some classes, and 3 grades together in others. Ann was a good student. Students would often go to the teacher's house for help and the teachers often came to the student's homes for dinner. Ann's siblings were employed in the local movie theater or worked in a store. Some worked in the fish cannery in the summer. The girls did house work and the boys put their name in to work in the mines when they were old enough. Douglas Island is 25 miles around, and about 3 miles across. It was neat, beautiful. There were mountains and Mt. Juneau and Mt. Robert. There was a fierce taku wind that blew 60 to 70 miles per hour in the fall and winter. Ann played baseball alot with the boys. This was not softball, it was hardball. "Baseball was going to be my vocation when I came to the states." Ann wanted to become a professional ball player on a women's team. 2 260 299 326 344 She married instead, "It was a better step, really." Ann quit high-school during the last 1/2 of her junior year. "It was ok to quit at that age- they couldn't do anything about it." Ann worked at the Douglas Island telephone exchange switchboard for $50.00/month which was not very much money- but "it kept me in sandwiches and magazines and puzzle-books," as well as cigarettes and alcohol. Young people drank alot- almost all the kids drank. You could get a cabdriver to buy a bottle. Ann could buy beer at a drugstore and wine at another store. "We availed ourselves of those commodities." We did drink alot. "Alaskans are noted for that!" We could drive 25 miles to the Mendenhall Glacier and 3 miles to Thane. "There was nothing to dothat was a good excuse anyway." Ann remembers that her father got a raise, from 90 cents/hr to $1.00/ hr. There was much rejoicing. Our family was not rich or poor. We had what we needed. We got most of our clothes from Sears. Douglas Island had three beer parlors and three grocery stores. The economy was ok. Alaska was still a territory of the U.S. Ann voted for the first time for Eisenhower. Ann's was a musical family. In her brother's band she played trumpet and accordion. It was lots of fun. Ann's mother collected the school tax by going door to door. The water tank owner also collected his tax by going door to door. Water tax was about $2.25 a month. During the dustbowl of the 1930's, Ann remembers that the Satko family left Oklahoma with a homemade yacht. They launched it in Puget Sound and sailed to Juneau. Everyone got out of school to see them. They settled in Juneau and had lots of kids named such things as Northwind, Southwind, Eastwind ... Ann saw Will Rogers who had flown to Juneau with Wiley Post (who had only one eye) . 3 374 389 398 416 441 450 SIDE TWO 006 Shortly afterwards, Rogers died in a plane wreck. In April, 1937 Ann again got out of school to celebrate the first Airmail to Juneau. Governor Troy was there and they staged a big celebration for the newsreel cameras. Ann got her driver's license when she was 14. She was a writer and once won an Elk's Club contest. She wrote the best paper for Highschool freshmen on the topic, "Why I was proud to be an American." Her paper was the best in Alaska and she won $25.00 and got her name in the paper. On Washington's birthday, Feb. 22, 1936, Ann's parent's house burned down in a large fire that claimed several houses on Douglas Island. The taku wind fanned the flames. Her family moved in with an older sister. Ann worked at the Douglas Ann never touched a fish, was fun to be part of the of the women worked there supplement their income. outside of the home." Fishery Cannery. she made cans. "It work force. Many in the summer to Few of them worked "The men liked the women. Their attitude towards women was ok. The average woman stayed at home and tended to children. They did the washing and waited for the men to come home." Douglas had 600 people on it when I was there. Juneau had about 8000. We rented, didn't buy our homes. After the fire, my father bought [a home] . He borrowed $200 for plywood and paid $20/month to a bank in Juneau. Our homes always had lots of rooms. "We had running water, indoor plumbing, a bathtub, toilet ... lived like we do now." "Before that, when the kids were home, I had very little to do - I probably had it to do, 4 25 80 104 140 173 185 but I didn't do it." We did the dishes as we grew older. My relationship with my mother was not all that great. Our Dad spoiled us. If we wanted money our mother said "NO!" But she was fun and musical too. We did music when we were together. We spent the holidays together and went to the grandparents for dinner. I often spent the holidays in Juneau with a girlfriend. On Christmas eve, the presents were passed out. One day I found out that there was no Santa Claus- it was sad. We didn't teach our children about Santa Claus because that's not the real reason for Christmas, it is the birth of Jesus. We often went on drives with Dad. Dad had a model A which was the first truck in Juneau. He bought it second-hand. To get it to Douglas Island, we had to wait until the tide goes out and then with planks and rocks, drive it across the bar to Douglas Island. Dad had a model T also. It was still on Douglas Island in 1944 when Dad died. We had to back the model A up steep 'hills because the gas didn't work right. The boys would sneak out and drive Dad's car when Dad was at work and it wasn't his turn to drive. In 1937, a bridge was built connecting Douglas Island and Juneau. My sister was the bridge queen. An uncle of mine from the states worked as an engineer on the bridge. A girlfriend and I were the first to walk across the bridge. The Daily Alaska Empire newspaper headline read, "Douglas Tomboys Cross Bridge." There was no more bringing cars across the bar. Sometimes we cooked our own breakfast. Sometimes our Dad cooked his favorite, oatmeal. When Dad was on the right shift/ he cooked oatmeal for our school lunch. We didn't have a hot lunch program then. I learned from my father how to make stew and how to make meatloaf. These were my two kitchen capers when I got married. 5 199 214 237 251 265 271 299 I was going to be a school teacher. I hoped to teach physical education and English, but I did neither of those. There were five girls that I ran around with. We are still the best of friends. We had dates with boys- we would go walking or to dances. The war came. December 7, 1941. It was a scary thing. I was working at the switchboard when the Juneau FBI man called the Douglas Island FBI man (who lived next door to us) and said that Pearl Harbor had been bombed. "And I was listening in, you know- we just listened when the FBI talked, it was never anything important- until now!" There were blackouts at night and air-raid drills. On June 13, 1943, I set sail for the states with my sister and her daughter. The ship was blacked out. "Of course, I smoked." "You never knew from the rumors when the Japanese people were coming. Our nerves were frayed." We rode the steamship "Northstar" to Wrangle, Petersburg (an Aunt of mine lived there who taught school), and Ketchikan (the largest port). "Seattle was huge!" One of my sisters lived in Tacoma and her husband worked in the foundry during the war. The first thing I did when I got to the states was help my sister can cherries. And I saw trains. We had no need for trains in Juneau. During the war, many of us drank. We could get into beer parlors. Police women were sent out because of the war, Mrs. Hartung was her name. Bartenders kept an eye out for her. We made fun of her. We would run out the back door when she came. I often went with my 28 year old sister when I was 17. I moved to Seattle and baby sat. We were called nurse maids or nurse girl. "I baby sat for a women whose husband was in the Navy and was gone. One night she had a date with a sailor, a coast guard guy. That was 6 329 363 368 375 392 423 common. Women would go out when their husbands were gone." The next night, he showed up with a friend for me. It was love at first sight. We were married April 18, 1944 in Seattle. My husband's name is James Alton Emerson. My husband worked on the Coast Guard cutter "Haida, 11 named after the Haida Indians. He was out to sea for 28 days and home for 5. He transferred to a Seattle warehouse. We had our first child in 1946. We moved to Albion, Washington in 1946. I had eight children. Michael, Patrick, James Jr., Peggy Ann, twins Kevin and Karen, David, and Dawn, born 12 years after David. She is now 23 years old, the oldest is 47. All of the children live in the area. We have 36 grandchildren- some are step grandchildren and we are all fairly close. Kevin was recently elected to the Albion town council by 2 votes. Most of the family attend the local church. I mostly did not work out of the home. Oh- I sorted peas in Colfax one year for a couple of months. I worked for one year while my husband's foot was in bad shape. I worked at a laundry in Pullman. I started to work at WSU but I got sick and had to quit. I was happier at home anyway- being more or less my own boss, being here when the kids came home. Cooking, I never much cared for cooking, but I did it. The WORST possible thing that can happen to me is to make me do the dishes. I just don't even like it. Now I do the dishes every couple of days. "That's a fact and I don't even care who knows it." I hated it when the kids left home. I cried. But I got over it. In 1991, the last one got married. They lived in an old church. Her husband was strangled accidently and it was very upsetting for the entire family. It was the family's biggest tragedy. My husband's family were founders of this area. [Albion]. His mother was a Kenoyer, 7 430 who were professional people. His mom was the postmaster at Albion for many years. During the war, I was a welder at the Todd shipyard in Seattle. I had a radio show on KBKH in 1951. I sang every other week opposite the Treble Triad of Pullman High-school. I now write the GuyAlbion Historical Society's newsletter every four months. I belonged to the Albion Women's club. My children were in little league. My husband was a farm laborer, but in 1953 he began at WSU as a stationary steam engineer. He worked there for 23 years. He is now an administrator at the Moose lodge in Pullman and I help out. Albion had about 230 people 1n it in 1946. It now has about 632 people. END OF TAPE AND INTERVIEW. 8 |
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