Get your own Free Home Page----- By Ginny Griffin:
W
e first lived in a duplex in Berlin [Pa.] but moved in the house in the early 30's around 1933 or 34. "Pop" [my dad] worked at the store but his father died when he was 5 years old and there was a big family and he had to go to work at a very young age. He worked on farms as a boy and in the mines for sometime.B
ack then the mothers didn't work, as Berlin had nothing to offer any way. The chip factory didn't come into town until the 40's. None of my classmates' mother's worked to my knowledge. Berlin was in Appalachia but some of the surrounding countryside had some very nice farms whose people had money.W
e had a huge garden and did a lot of canning and drying corn and beans. Of course there was no automatic washers and dryers so it took a good bit of time tending to all the chores. Flour and sugar was bought in 100 lb. bags and mother baked lots of bread, rolls, pies and cakes. During the depression I remember "homeless" men coming up from the train station and asking mom for food. It was summer and she would always fix a plate for them and they would sit on the porch and eat. I was always a little frightened but they were very thankful and polite.A
s to entertainment, the movies didn't come to town until the 40's and it is no longer in operation. I was so glad when the bookmobile finally came to town every week or ten days. I always enjoyed reading -- a means of escape maybe?W
hen "Pop" died and we went to sell the house the lawyer told us that the median income was less than 20,000 and that was in 1981. When Mike was there he remarked about the beauty of the mountains and did the people appreciate them, but there is just not much to keep the young folks there.I
t was the same in California, Pa. J.L. [my late husband's dad] went to Mich. and worked at Ford Motor but nana [my dad's mom] wouldn't move there so he came back and was the town policeman. He also had coal trucks later, and worked on the river barges before that.----- By Leta Willoughby:
As I was thinking about growing up and the economic conditions of the times, I realized that my thoughts are quite different now than when I was growing up.
I grew up in the 60's and 70's, which many consider tumultuous times, but I believe they were truly great years to be a kid. Though I have two older brothers and one older sister, in many respects, it seemed as if I was an only child. My brothers and sister were all basically out of the house by the time I was school age. Although my family wasn't affluent by any means, I lacked for nothing, and was spoiled rotten. I know that times were much tougher than I ever knew, but my mother shielded me from most of that.
My father went to work for Phillips Petroleum in 1934 in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, Phillips' headquarters. He and my mother married in 1938 and he was transferred to the Gulf Coast of Texas, where they remained until their deaths (his in 1978 and hers in 2000). Though life wasn't easy all the time during those years, it was consistent, and there was always a paycheck and food on the table. In 1964, Phillips began to cut back and combine many of their field offices. The office in Alvin, our hometown, was one of those offices greatly affected. My father was transferred to Abbeyville, Louisiana and worked offshore drill rigs. He would work a week offshore and be home a week. We remained in Alvin and he would come home and then head back to the drill rigs. This continued for several months, but finally became too much for him, healthwise I believe, and he retired from Phillips after 30 years of service. My father went to work for the local pipefitters union. Life changed for us. As I said, paychecks were consistent with Phillips, as daddy was salaried…but with the union, he got paid when he worked…and work was scarce, and layoffs were abundant. In recalling lean times, those were the lean times I remember. Daddy had been layed off….and I can remember Mama collecting coke bottles to return to help put food on the table. I'm sure there were many lean times over the years that I didn’t have a clue about, but as I said, Mama shielded me from so much of that. I remember that we had beans and cornbread more often than not…and as I think about it now….it must have been because of the money shortage….and I just thought we REALLY liked beans and cornbread!! I'm sure she went without many times, so that I could have what I needed or wanted. As I said…I'm sure I was spoiled rotten!
I think one of the greatest blessings I had growing up was the fact that my mother did not work outside of the home for most of my childhood. My mother was a seamstress, and before I was of school age, she would do tailoring for a local department store and a cleaners in town. She would pick up the items, or they would deliver to the house. When I was in the 4th grade, mother went to work for the school and worked the same hours and days that I was in school, which was perfect…she was always at home when I was. She continued to do this until I graduated from high school. It was always so nice to know that when I got home…she would be there…and usually there was a great smell coming from the kitchen! Many of my friends' mothers had begun working outside the home…so our home was never without a houseful of kids usually after school!
----- By Tom Griffin:
My impression growing up was that although we weren't poor by any stretch of the imagination, mom and dad were 'frugal'. Dad worked mainly as a schoolteacher, teaching Drivers Education. But he also worked 2 other jobs as near as I could tell. He worked at 'Court' teaching 'remedial driving' to those motorists that had run afoul of the law once too often. Finally he worked at the Wayne State University, teaching other teachers how to teach drivers ed.
Mom didn't work outside of the home, but rather worked on keeping the home picked up, cleaned and the family fed. Besides the regular meals and packing lunches for Dad and the kids, mom baked cookies, brownies and other treats. Dad worked evenings about 3 nights a week, so we often had dinner about 7 PM when he got home. I would think that mom must have been a little discouraged because she sometimes spent a lot of the day preparing the meal and it would quickly be wolfed down by us!
At the same time, I do remember a couple things that indicated, to me at least, that we must be just above going to the poor house (these were in addition to the fact that mom kept telling us that’s where we were headed!). For example, we had been known to drink the dehydrated milk. We also had Canned Beef on Toast (S. o. S. for those old enough to know!). And to add insult to injury I believe we saved the glass jars the beef came in, to use as juice glasses!
We never wanted for clothing (nor much of anything else), although I do recall having to buy blue jeans that were too long and mom would turn up the cuffs so I could 'grow into them'. Also if (when?) I would get a hole in the knee; she would use these god-awful iron-on patches that never seemed to stay attached to the blue jeans more than a few minutes.
For vacations, I knew we were very fortunate, rich in fact, in that we had a travel trailer that allowed us to go on summer trips. I also recall several 'Spring Break' trips too. Although in those days I thought we called them Easter Vacation Trips. We traveled throughout the country getting to all the states except Hawaii. We also went to each of the Canada Providence's. To be totally truthful however, I must confess on more than one occasion, I did wish that we could stay in a hotel, and do the room service thingie!
I think dad was way ahead of his time. He said things … many many years ago that I hear repeated to this day by professional momey managers. Things like "Dollar Cost Average", "Pay yourself first", "Stay out of Debt, but have a good credit rating" are just a few of his pieces of wisdom he tried to impart. He enjoyed his investing especially through the dividend reinvestment programs offered by NAIC (at that time National Association of Investment Clubs). However, although it may have been very practical, I have not seen any indication of widespread adaptation of his unique envelope and graph paper methods of budgeting and expense recording systems.
If you would like to add your own recollections please email them to me at tgriffin@voyager.net
and I will try to get them posted.| Sign Guestbook | View Guestbook |
Click here to return to Main Page
This page hosted by Get your own Free Home Page