Interview with Barbara (B), Philomena (P), and Rose Senger (RS)

Conducted by Dale Davis (DD)
Bismarck, North Dakota, 22 July 2004

Transcription by Hope Wald
Edited by Linda Haag

DD: Good afternoon girls, I sure appreciate this opportunity of being able to interview you. Why don’t you tell me your name; we’ll go with Philomena.

P: Philomena.

DD: Philomena. What was your maiden name?

P: Senger.

DD: What is your married name?

P: Weigum.

DD: Can you both say that in German? Say your names in German?

P: I said it. I can talk German.

DD: Well I’m sure [laughter]

P: All my kids talk German.

DD: Most do. What’s your father’s name?

P: [Hedred?]

DD: And your mother’s name?

P: [?]

DD: Could you name your sisters?

P:[...Annette...Rosa, Barbara, Mary?]

DD: All laid back. [Laughing] The different sounds of your voices and your voice.... You’re talking with your sisters, and could you introduce yourselves. Oldest first.

P: [Philmenia?] Weigum.

R: Rose [Wald?]

DD: What were your maiden names?

P&R: Senger.

DD: How old are you Philmenia?

P: Seventy-nine the date of September 3rd.

DD: September the 3rd. What year were you born?

P: ’11.

DD: 1911. Yours?

R: I’m 86, I was born February 1918.

DD: What is your father’s name?

R: [Hedrick?]

P: Mine too. [Laughing]

DD: And your mothers?

R: [?]

DD: And her maiden name was?

R: Schmidt.

DD: Who did you marry Rose?

R: [Herb Anton Wald?]

DD: When were your married? Do you remember the date?

R: Oh, that was December the 6th 1939.

DD: And Philmenia, when did you get married?

P: November 18th 1930.

DD: And who did you marry?

P: Joe Weigum.

DD: Philmenia, how many children did you have?

P: Twelve.

DD: Twelve. And Rose.

R: Nine.

DD: When did your parents come over?

P: My mother came in 1910. 1910. My Dad was born here.

DD: How old was your mother when she came over?

P: 20.

DD: And your father was born here.

P: In the United States.

DD: Do you know about when this [?] came over?

P: 1886. [...May or April...23rd of May a year and three weeks they said.?]

DD: That was in 1886. Do you know what year the Schmidt’s came over then?

P: The Schmidt’s, the Schmidt’s came in 1910.

DD: In 1910. When was your mother born?

P: 19...1889 January the 16th.

DD: And your father was born?

P: In 1889 December the 18th.

DD: They were born the same year.

P: Yeah.

DD: The beginning of the year and the...

P: End of the year. Yeah.

DD: Do you remember anything that your mother said about what it was like over in Russia?

P: I regret...you know we talked about it but you know it was not like we said anything you know that was interesting.

?: Whatever she did want to do she did, she worked,...did to come home, she locked herself out of the well and drink...I mean they work all day, and they did hard work.

DD: What was it like when you were little, if you did all this when you got older?

P: I don’t know. I think we just grew up like that, like we raised our other children. I know we did not have all the privileges that my kids had.

DD: How did you let the house? You turn the light switch on?

P: [Laughing] we didn’t know any better, and everybody was the same too, it was the way of life.

DD: Now did you have like kerosene lamps?

P: Oh no.

?: We had electricity.

P: Well we thought we were grown already, we were married already when we got electricity. But, uh, when we grew up we...

?: We didn’t know any better we thought we had it good.

DD: Now when you were growing up what were some of the things you had to do? Or did one of your family’s moms, in the house do chores? Because you had all girls to start with, so you had no older brothers to do some of the chores and stuff?

P: She, had to go out, which I...my sister...

DD: Could you explain a little bit more Philomenia on how you did the following?

P: ...the horses did some.

DD: There were always horses?

P: Right.

DD: There were five horses and just one bottom [five?]

P: Two.

DD: Two bottom [five?]

P: I had one once and I kicked it [?]

DD: And you’re ok from that? You didn’t get hurt. Did you have names for your horses?

P: Oh yeah, oh yeah.

DD: Do you remember any of the names of the horses?

P: The one I always rode, the one that threw me is [?]. [Laughing]

DD: Did you have enough cows to milk? Could you explain how you went about that. You know in the morning did you get up about...and help...

P: I don’t know what time we usually got up, early...about six.... Well in the winter time we never milked a lot of cows. We probably had six or seven.

DD: So you did have some cows to milk. Your greater percentage of cows came... Now did you have a regular barn for cows? Did you bring them in everyday?

P: Well in the winter time they probably had to stay in all day. Summer months we milked in the sheds outside. Just the fact that...were milking...that’s all we did in there was milk.

DD: And I suppose that’s better then being in a hot barn or something like that.

P: I suppose.

DD:...Why is there milk...

P: You would have to put them in the barn and spray it so they’d get wet.

DD: Now did you save the milk or did you separate it?

P: Separate it.

DD: Who did the separating?

P: Everyone.

DD: So that wasn’t a job for one...Where did you put the cream and stuff after you separated it?

P: In the root cellar.

DD: You didn’t have a refrigerator?

P: No.

DD: Where was your father when you grew up?

P: Ten miles north of Hague....

DD: Now do you remember did your mother talk much about... I now you don’t remember a lot, but does anything really stick out in your mind, like you know some people say like boyfriends come around.

P: At that time they weren’t over there. One thing that stuck in my mind, you know that I called about, she said they had a cow that had rabies, and they put her in a fence and just blew water on her until she was dead. That I could never figure out. They just poured water on her until she was dead. I came to...to talk about rabies...and when her friend drowned then she talked about it.

DD: Explain a little bit more about that.

P: She said they were sitting beside the, whatever they were swimming at, and she insisted going into swim, she went into drown. They pulled her out and placed her across the horse.

[Unsure of what is said between multiple people in this section]

DD: Did she say anything about the house and stuff?

P: Not really. That’s one thing I regret...you know about the beds or anything like that...I know what they had...with cord.

DD: How was it to sleep on a cordless mattress?

P: Oh, the first night they slept on it they didn’t want to give it up. They threw it out the...they were so mad, just didn’t want to give it up...

DD: What do you remember of your grandparents?

?: I knew Grandma Schmidt. I knew a little about Grandpa Schmidt.

P: He was a mean man, he was. When you came out you had to sweep all...from every wall. Grandma was 92 when she died, but Grandpa was only 67, he had heart problems...

DD: Did you need your sisters and brothers in order if possible. [Laughing]

P: [Me, Philomena, Donatela, then it’s her, then it’s her.?]

DD: Who?

P: Barbara. [Then it’s Mary and Mike?]

DD: Can you explain a little bit about your house, about the farmstead? Do you know a little bit of, of what it’s made out of?

P: Sod. Then we had to paper it...the walls were papered...

DD: Do you remember about how big the walls were?

P: Not that big. The windows we could sit on.

DD: Was it pretty warm in the winter time?

P: Yeah, and cool in the summer.

DD: And cool in the summer.

P: Well if you said you were going to [stop?] there...And I was born in that house, and got married in that house.

DD: You were married in the house too? Could you tell us a little bit about your marriage day?

P: It was snowing [Laughing], we had a party, we danced.

DD: What was some of the food that you had?

P: Chicken, sausage, what else, kuchen...

?: [?] When you got married did you have that chicken and kuchen and all that?...

P: We had dinner and supper...early in the morning, it was still dark when we went to church the next day...the first one burned down...

DD: And then where after you were [...?...] where did you go? Some farm not too far away.

P: No, we were only about three miles apart. We knew each other all our life. That’s why he got...

DD: Did you go to school together?

P: No...

DD: [...?] Could you explain a little bit more?

P: ...Well, it was nice and sunny, there was no snow...60° outside...I was talking about last night, I don’t remember what we ate, or if we ate that day, did we eat that day?

DD: Did you get married at the St. Mary’s church then?

P: Yeah, I think we all got married there, except [Cheryl?]...

DD: Now some of your...can you explain a little bit about how someone that doesn’t manage...some people...and my family...and their good, but could you explain a little bit of the preparation and the process of a couple of the dishes?

P: Well we never made any [Struga]...but we made [dulfnu] out of bread dough...

DD: Was there anything on them?

P: No, sometimes we had prunes with them...

DD: Did you have warm milk, bread; did you have anything like that?

P: No.

DD: Some of them were, more like a...

P: And I got a daughter, she still makes the bread. One of her sons...

DD: How many, when your mother or one of you girls made bread when you were still home, how many loaves would you make?

P: About eight.

?: Twice a week.

P: Yep. I did that too when we were married. After July one of our sons called me and said Mom, what should I bring? Chicken or beef or whatever you want. And I said Gerald, I would want watermelon. I’m going to make some nudla. He didn’t mention no meat anymore, and he’d always eat the pan when he came over. Oy, oy, I got a...of nudla and potatoes when he came over. You know one and a half was left...[Laughing]. I said Gerald I have a half a watermelon. He asked me if I wanted watermelon, I said oh about a half. And that was the end of the meat, then everything, he go what shall I bring? Then he brought cherries, and egg rolls, and peaches, and I don’t know what they brought back.

DD: What type of stove did you use? Could you explain a little bit about it? Like say, I remember just being like the old cook stove was like, could you explain it a little bit more?

P: We’d have to burn wooden or coals, or cow chips.

DD: Was it the central oven?

P: Central oven, yeah.

DD: Did yours have a water tank on it?

P: Mine did. Mine did...

DD: It was pretty decent...compared to the stove now you can turn things on.

P: There you had to wait, but then you could use the whole stove.

DD: Did you have to start the stove every morning?

P: I think we started ours every morning.

?: Yeah, go to the barn and get some hay, get some hay...oh yeah...I was too scared to go upstairs in the barn with the hay. You didn’t need too much, so I usually got me some in the [?].

DD: Talking about hay. How did you put it up here? Could you explain a little bit of the process?

?: How did you put yours up? You, you.

DD: We did it with a, an old farm hand motor bucket. That’s how we started to do ours.

P: When we grew up we loaded it with a fork.

?: There was a rope inside on the front, and then when we got home we hooked up...

P: Horses on one end to pull it out. And then the pile we had to go and carry it out...I know how that works.

DD: How did you cut that?

P: Well we had that [horse?] to cut it with. I did that.

DD: Could you explain a little bit how you did that?

P:...that’s about it, then you came with a wrecker, make a pile, and pick it up again. I did it. Ask me when I didn’t.

DD: I’m sure you did most everything.

P: I did. See us three were much older then the rest...we were always in the water.

DD: I understand that there’s a special way you guys caught fish. Can you explain that?

P: With a fish box.

DD: But we were lucky enough to have a crick down by us.

P: Oh, we had one just behind us. Only a couple of blocks... But us three, we were the oldest ones...

DD: How did you, cause you were the oldest girl, did you help the little ones when they were small? Or did you do more stuff outside?

P: Outside, we had to pitch in outside. If I took care of like...

?: And when we had the twins they were laying in one bed, one on this end, one on the other end. And...came over and got water. Everyday we came and you had to run out, sit down...I was going to go down too but the twins didn’t sleep...

P: Well we didn’t...we were all girls...yet we had...when we came home. We didn’t want it.

?: You know we were just six years old...getting water.

DD: Could you explain that fish pond? Catching fish down there a little bit?

P: Yeah, you know the [creed rat it came from the fish box]...

?: It got into the box and it couldn’t get out. So when you want to get the fish out you put the [board so the water doesn’t run in].

P: And in the winter when it was ice, then you’d put a hole in the ice...sometimes it was so icy when he came home. But he really liked it.

DD: So you ate quite a bit of fish? I suppose that gave you quite a bit of variety.

P: No, there were only two kinds.

DD: No I mean from fish to sausage.

P: Oh, oh we had a lot of choices to pick.

DD: A lot of people weren’t fortunate enough to live by...

P: Live by the crick. We talk about the...I grew up by the crick...

DD: Did you learn how to swim that way?

P: No, we did not. In a tube in the water that’s how we did. We, to me it was like a pool, better than a pool. But the further you went in the deeper the water got. So we went into it, then we walked. Well we tried to swim out but we didn’t because you could stand up. The further we went in the deeper it got.

DD: Did the water run so fast?

P:...Springs...In the summertime we’d shower.

DD: Were you ever worried about...

P: On this side it was high, but the other side it could run out...I says that’s interesting, that doesn’t seem interesting at all to move to a lake to a cabin.

DD: Now how about when you went to school. Philomena, you’re the oldest and got to go school first.

P: I know.

DD: Could you explain a little, do you remember any of your teacher’s names?

P: [...?...she’d have twins here, and the next...]

[Multiple people speaking, can’t understand]

DD: So now about how many, do you remember about how many students there were?

P: There were quite a few, oh yeah. I remember like at the last...

R: We had 32 in every class. One teacher, one teacher.

DD: Do you remember some of your teachers [Rose?]

R: Mary Merlot was my first one. I can remember nobody. They had to always stay home, and I had to go to school alone. I could not speak English; and she couldn’t speak German. I had no idea what she said...and Laurence Hanson, Alice Burnett, and Marie [Schleitzermen].

DD: Now did you guys drive to school everyday?

R: We walked to school.

DD: About how far away was the school?

R: It was about a mile and a half, or two.

DD: And I suppose it was uphill both ways?

R: Uh huh.

?: How did you go to school.

DD: Well our country school was a half a mile away. When we were little we’d walk.

[Bell ringing in the background and cannot understand.]

R: It never occurred to me that I would like to go to school, cause I had to work.

?: There were a lot of kids back then.

R: I know there were 32.

?: And one teacher.

DD: Now did the older students help the younger students when you were going to school? Or did they have their own set...

R: Grandpa helped me. Grandpa helped me.

DD: You spoke German before you went to school. What was it like knowing German, like you said not knowing English?

R: I don’t know, I don’t remember you know was it bad or not, being I couldn’t speak English. But I must of picked it up quite fast.

DD: Who was the teacher?

R: Mary Merlot was the teacher when I started. And she couldn’t speak German. The others they did speak German, but Mary Merlot she couldn’t. And then we had Lauren Hanson who couldn’t speak English, he was the one who always gave us [?] everyday.

DD: So in the schoolhouse you were supposed to speak English? What about like out on the playground? You had a playground didn’t you?

R: A ditch. And when the teacher wasn’t around we always spoke German. And when we thought we were off school ground we spoke German.

DD: Do you remember some of the games you played as a child?

R: [Andy, Andy, over?] Sure we would tell our kids what we did. The grandchildren we would tell them all these stories. [...?...] My great grandchildren are only 5 years old.

DD: How old is your oldest living child?

R: She’s going on 73, 73 in September.

DD: Now about church. You were raised, how were you raised? Now were there any special things that you remember about going to church? How the church spoke English or German?

R: German, German.

DD: You all spoke German?

R: Yeah, as long as we had the priest, the priest was a German.

DD: Now catechism. That was all in German?

R: No. Catechism, that was in English.

DD: Now could you explain a typical Sunday? Going to church, did you do anything else?

R: It’s usually going to church...visiting you know, other then that we never did much of anything.

DD: Now what about weddings, was it a real big fancy ceremony like they are now?

R: No, no. There were church weddings but they were not...?....

DD: Now did you partake in any during the week, get married, Friday, or a Saturday?

R: No, mine were usually on a Monday or a Tuesday. We got married on a Tuesday. We got married on a Tuesday.

?: Yeah, Tuesday. You had to clean chickens on Monday.

R: We got married on a Tuesday night. You know it was either Monday or Tuesday.

?: You had to make kuchen.

R: That was done already. I don’t know what we ate that day, when we got married. There weren’t six bridesmaids, there were two, two that’s all.

DD: A male witness, and a female witness?

R: there were two girls and two boys.

[people talking but very mumbled]

DD: Did they have a big meal or anything like that?

R: Oh yeah...everybody brought something.

DD: Did you go to a funeral parlor, and all of the insurance...

R: The church...in the hall or something...like ours we’d all get together. There’d be a big draw....

P: I know when Grandpa died...at [Hague?], you know where he was buried at the church....

DD: Ok,...I do have a couple, were gonna talk about...

[Hard to understand]

R: Joe’s grandparents, Joe’s dad died when he was 10 years old. He was 32 when he had tam Vic surgery.

[End of tape, side A]

DD: You didn’t have a doctor that you could drive to, or a hospital that you could drive to?

R: You didn’t go to the hospital, but you had a doctor.

?: Well Ma had the first baby...sitting beside the bed...she never was in the hospital.

R: Me and my [?] we had the doctor that came into the house.

DD: Right, there was a hospital...towels.

R: And the later ones were born in the hospital.
DD: Did the doctor perform the [?] in the home or was it in the hospital? Did you get pretty sick from that?

R: I almost died.

DD: A lot of people died.

R: They had it too, but not as bad as I had it. They were laying and couldn’t move when I ran out the wall, I couldn’t get no air. And then one time...just let me die, why didn’t they let me die?...And she was laying with them and she didn’t get it, she didn’t get nothing.

DD: Did some of the diseases kind of make their rounds so to speak? When you guys got it...

R: That cemetery, there were seven Feist’s in a row that died. They weren’t brothers, they were just cousins. But they still were Feist's.

?: There was only one cousin. The others were all brothers.

DD: How bout the 1918 flu epidemic. Did anyone you know die from that?

R: My Dad, I don’t know what he did, but he didn’t get it.

DD: Do you know what I mean when I say [galtha?]; [galtha?] did anyone in your family have that? Or someone around?

R: We had some in town.

?: Oh yeah, we still have some, we still have some.

DD: What was your typical breakfast growing up? What would you have for breakfast?

R: Cereal, Sausage.

DD: Was the cereal like it is today?

R: Not as many kinds.

DD: Was it similar?

R: It was similar, similar. Cornflakes, cornflakes, mostly it was cornflakes and oatmeal.

DD: Did you raise quite a few chickens then?

R: We had a lot of chickens; we had a lot of chickens.

DD: Now did you go to the store and buy the chickens?

R: No. The chicken man come around and then you buy...No chickens, no....

?: And then we had turkeys, and then we had geese.

R: Chicken man come and brought chickens.

[This part of the tape is too quiet to understand.]

R: You traded off chicken eggs.

DD: What were some of the typical [?]

R: Ours were always these green ones, and we traded them off and we got red ones.

DD: Were some of them better at laying eggs? Or better at feeding?

R: Well, I think most of them were better layers. We didn’t raise any leghorns....

DD: And did you sell the eggs?

R: Oh yeah. I sell em. The red and the green.

DD: How often did you have to take the...

R: They only go Saturdays, the only time they go through town. We did too, just Saturdays....And you know how much one time, we got two...

DD: Now when you sold eggs and cream did you buy clothes back? Or did you buy...

R: Groceries, groceries...and he brought home a load of coal. Coal for the fire. Eight or ten dollars.

DD: So he’d come back with whatever you needed.

R: Coal, coal, coal, coal...No, Temvik...

?: He took off a load of weed I know one morning, he came home late, we had to carry it up the stairs.
DD: Just a little bit of time left on the tape.

R: Are we done?

DD: Yeah.

*This is the start of the last 37 minutes of the second tape.

[Lady is speaking, but cannot understand]

DD: Are you German?

P: When John Vetter died, the boots...he had...he prayed everything in German...Just because he prayed everything in German...I’ve tried it already, I can do it you know.

?: Not like we used to.

[Very hard to understand this section]

DD: What are some of the tradition’s that are carried on in your family? You have like, well uh, let’s say Christmas for an example. Do you have a certain ritual you go through. I mean do you have to do this, or do you have to go to this place, or do you have to send a lot of Christmas cards, or do you have to make a lot of phone calls?

?: No. We just send a lot of Christmas cards because we didn’t know anything about them.

R: I didn’t send any. The tradition it was we went to midnight mass. And I still do.

?: I still do too.

R: And our kids came home... it was a blizzard or not, sometimes they left, sometimes they had to stay over...

DD: Now you all grew up prior to the depression? Can you explain a little bit of what it was like growing up and living through the depression?

R: I talked about it already. I was too young yet you know, and I know we were not poor poor.

?: We had the same aids and everything there.

R: Yeah, because we had neighbor’s that were poor. So I knew we had more, we were comfortable with what we had. I couldn’t say that we lacked something cause we didn’t have no money or something like that.

DD: Can you hear of everyone saying how the the dirty 30’s were. Can you explain a little bit about the way the wind blew?

R: Yeah, you know there was in 34, 36, and 38, there was no crop at all.

?: 38 was dark.

R: 39 we still got our first crop. When I was young yet it didn’t faze me. But we had enough to eat. There was no welfare.

DD: What do you remember about the social security and things like that that there wasn’t anything like that. And then Roosevelt tried to do all these changes. What do you remember about that and how did you feel? I know you weren’t an old enough adult where some of that would affect you like it would in let’s say when you were in your 30’s or 40’s, but do you remember what your folks said about some of that stuff? How things were going on at that time?

R: The...[?]...social security. So you know....

DD: Right that came in later. But do all these programs that were supposed to start or to help...the CCC programs.

?: CCC, WTA, WTA, CC those were the boys who went to Canonsburg, you know they got 15 dollars...And coffee, I took a gallon can of eggs down to the [?], a pound of coffee 15 cents, red rooster. They had to grind it or whatever they did...

R: See I was too young yet to know that we were poor. We were poor but we didn’t know it [Laughing].

DD: And you were living in the situation that he was there.

?: We had the same bread, the same meat, and eggs.

DD: Now in the years that it didn’t rain, or we didn’t get enough hay for example for your cows.

R: Now I know we did have to sell lots of cows.

DD: You did have to sell all the cows?

R: Not all of them...

DD: How did you prepare the fissels for the cattle?

R: Just put em all in a big pile. But it wasn’t very good. They’d get diarrhea. Some horses died.
?: When were you born?

DD: 1952.

R: Gerald was born in 54’.

?: You were just a kid then.

R: Gerald was born in 50’... yeah Gerald was born in 54’. One dies at 39 or 49...two in 38 years...two years old when she died...

DD: Did they die right after birth?

R: Yeah right after. 39 and 49.

DD: Was that pretty hard losing your baby? If you don’t want to talk about it you don’t have to.

?: [?]

DD: Six.

?: That’s not so bad.

DD: You know now days you don’t hear, you know some days there aren’t as much as back in history. You know a lot of babies died and a lot of ladies died giving birth. You don’t want to talk about it that’s fine too. But just try and find help with some of the feelings that you have and hope she went through. Try to accomplish. Cause you went through a different time. Your generation went through the horse and buggy. I know you’ve seen walking on the moon, you’ve seen computers all this stuff, you have seen so much...

?: Difference.

DD: Yeah, you know that’s why I’m trying to get some...

?: I wonder if earlier days they come up with...

DD: You know there was always new technology...some of it’s good some of it isn’t.

R: I always said we start on the bottom. Now days they start up there and come down. I just saw in the paper this morning bankruptcy.

DD: Well now talking about something like that, when you were growing up, when you were first starting your married lives, did you go into the bank and borrow a bunch of money, or have credit cards?
R: One time 400 dollars. I never had a credit card. No credit. I would go to sears and apply. If I couldn’t pay right away, forget it...

DD: Now do you remember going into the depression, and those that did lose their farms do you remember some of that, some people that had to leave cause they couldn’t make their payments?

R: Bankruptcy that’s the [?]...I’m sure they were in trouble, but you didn’t know it, you were too young to know it you know.

?: You had bread and milk or coffee.

DD: Cause you hear of so many people where the banks were closing on them, or they quit paying taxes, or they owned land and didn’t have to pay a land payment, but a lot of them just quit paying the taxes at that time.

R: The land bought, that was lost, and he lost it. We bought Grandma’s land.

DD: When was that? Do you remember? How many acres did you buy?

R: I don’t know. She had over a thousand acres. We didn’t buy anything. They each bought their shares so much. Then we bought it from them.

DD: Oh, oh, oh.

R: Well my dad died in 64’ and he had 640 acres in land. But I think we got...

DD: That was pretty good money back then.

R: And we bought ours very cheap. We got ours in 45’ and then you know we just...?...

DD: Do you remember the first car you bought?

?: That coupe...

R: I know we didn’t have a car when we first got married...We were living with his folks, we had no expenses either. But that’s why I don’t know what really poor is. I would have to go and borrow some flour because there was none in the house...

DD: What was it like dating? When you were...

?: Why you wanna learn or something?

DD: Well maybe, I mean you never know. When you went on a date...

?: Sit around and visit from one neighbor to the next.
DD: Did you have barn dances?

?: Oh yes, every Sunday we had a barn dance.

DD: Could you explain that a little bit?

?: You go upstairs, you went upstairs with the ladder outside you crawled up there...You hauled hay during the day, in the evening you went to barn dances...

[Cannot understand this section of the tape]

DD: Do you remember going to your first show?

R: Not really.

?: I remember we went to Zeeland Sunday evenings in our car from Hague when we lived in Hague...

R: The first one I think I remember was in Hague outside club. And they had it on the outside.

?: And we sat on the ground.

R: And we sat on the ground. I never liked the show...But we went to the movies a lot after we were married...

?: Did you ever go to the movies when you were little?

DD: When we were little my Grandma would go on Saturday night’s. She’d go shopping and stuff like that, and my Grandma would give us money to go see the show, and we would buy one ticket and pop and popcorn and we would sometimes get candy. And she always gave us a dollar and we would have 35, 40 cents leftover. [Laughing]

R: Our kids, I don’t know they went to the movies too. You know as our kids grew up...

?: I don’t know we used to compete...the halls...sit on the bleachers like...of the shows up there.

DD: You girls have any advise for the younger generation. How things are done today versus when you were growing up?

[cannot understand]

DD: Did any of you own a bicycle when you were younger?

?: ...how many kids did they have? Gefre’s?
R: Nine.

?: Just about all boys then. They were all boys.

R:...There was never a road to drive a bicycle. Well or some later on. But I never learned to drive. In the house in the kitchen, between the...trees and the pool table, you know they were this far apart. I put the bicycle in between and sat on it, I didn’t drive I just tried to steady myself on it.

DD: Ok, I want to thank you very much for this opportunity that you gave me.

R: I hope you learned something.

DD: Oh yes.

R: Something good?

DD: Oh, some good stuff.

R: Huh?

DD: Some good stuff. You definitely learned how to speak German before you learned anything else. Now can you write German?

?: Never.

R: I used to write my name in German but I haven’t done that for so long. I probably could still do it.

[End of tape.]