Matewan Oral History Project Collection
Sc2003-135

Grace Hatfield Interview

Becky Bailey: Becky Bailey's interview, this 2:30 (P.M.) June, 1989, for the Matewan Development Center with Grace Hatfield resident of Warm Hollow, in her home. Ms. Hatfield, you say your from Pennsylvania originally?

Grace Hatfield: Uh-huh. Tamawkawa(?)

B: Tamawkawa(?) And when were you born?

GH: Where?

B: When and where?

GH: I was born uh...September the 9th, 1899, Tamawkawa,(?) Pennsylvania.

B: And who were your parents?

GH: Uh...George and Kathryn Stienart(?)

B: What did your father do?

GH: A railroader.

B: He was a railroader. Uh...Do you know when they were born? You don't.

GH: I have no idea.

B: Did you come here uh...to Matewan as a child?

GH: No I uh...come down to visit my brother, that lived in uh...in Welch. And then come on down here and started working in 1920, 1924 I guess it was, I come down here.

B: Did you come by yourself?

GH: Uh-huh.

B: And where did you start working?

GH: Leckie's Drug Store.

B: Where was that?

GH: Down in Matewan on the, and then I worked there several months, and I worked to, at Shaffer's Department Store for five or six years.

B: Do you know what stores were in town? Do you remember some of the stores that were in town?

GH: My goodness, lets see, Comptons, it was a grocery store, uh...um...Claire Overstreet had a store. Uh...Sanders had a grocery store. Then Leckie's had a drug store and there was uh...uh...a jewelry store across the street I believe was Testerman's if I'm not mistaken.

B: And this was in 1924?

GH: Around 1924.

B: What other kind of jobs did you do when, when you were...

GH: Here?

B: Uh-huh. You worked in...

GH: Oh well then, when I uh...quit the uh...store my husband and I had a restaurant and pool room.

B: And your husband was?

GH: Dewey.

B: Dewey.

GH: Hatfield.

B: Hatfield. Do you know when he was born?

GH: Uh...lets see he was sixty-four when he, he died and he's been dead twenty-nine years.

B: So he was born in 1896 probably?

GH: I imagine.

B: Okay. Did you go to school in Pennsylvania? Did you go to...

GH: I quit when I, when I was sixteen years old. And I went to working in a stocking factory.

B: What kind of work did you do there?

GH: Well they made stockings. And uh...I was a turner, when they were made they were uh...inside out and I uh...they had machines that...I put stockings on and turned it. Then from there I went to the shirt factory. And I worked myself up in the shirt factory until I was a floor lady, I worked the floor.

B: Was the....

GH: And you'd be surprised how much I uh...earned.

B: How much?

GH: $17.50 a week, from six in, from eight, no...seven in the morning until six at night.

B: Oh goodness. What did you do with that money that you made?

GH: Well I'd help my family you know, then buy my own clothes. Of course then that went a long way. But uh...and then I uh...from there, there I worked at, in uh...power co. uh...the Atlas Powder Company through the war.

B: Is this the first World War?

GH: Uh-huh.

B: Okay. Did you have any brothers and sisters?

GH: Yes, I had, I had three sisters, two living, I had seven brothers, but there's only one living.

B: Where did you fit in, which, how do you know what number child you were?

GH: Yeah number four.

B: You were number four.

GH: I was the girl, uh...girl the first girl.

B: You were the first girl.

GH: Uh-huh.

B: If you don't mind me asking, did you mother have a doctor to help her with the deliveries?

GH: Oh yes.

B: She did.

GH: Yeah, she had nine children then had uh...uh...twins, made eleven.

B: So, the babies were twins and the baby of the family.

GH: Uh-huh...

B: What were...

GH: A man and a woman doctor, both of them. But they had them at the house, they didn't go to hospitals then. Had them at home.

B: When your mother would have your younger brother and sisters, did you know what was happening?

GH: Oh yes, sure.

B: What did she tell you?

GH: Well uh...you know you learn and uh...I don't know I did the work and helped when she had the babies when I, I helped. Did the work.

B: Did any family come and stay with you all when your mother would be having a baby?

GH: No.

B: You would help her?

GH: Uh-huh.

B: Do you know how many year apart were you all born?

GH: Oh I have it in there, if you want me to get it.

B: Well the first person on this list that you have here is your brother Roland, is that how you said it?

GH: Yeah, well now there was one born, lets see, there was one born before him, but he, that was George, and he died at infancy. But I just don't have any idea it must have been in uh...if Roland was born in 1992 (1892), it might have been two or three years before that.

B: Okay. Do you, what did uh...what did you brother Roland do for a living? Do you know?

GH: He uh...worked in offices down here he came down, that's how I'm here.

B: Was he the one that you came to visit?

GH: Uh-huh.

B: Okay. How about your brother Paul? I see he was born in 1897.

*(This is a correction inserted by the editor for clarity.

GH: Uh-huh. Uh...he was a carpenter, he could just do about anything.

B: Well it seems like they all lived a great long while.

GH: Yes.

B: And then, then came you.

GH: Uh-huh.

B: Ok, well get back to you in a minute. How about this sister Kathryn?

GH: Well uh...she uh...uh...she didn't work. She stayed at home. She helped mother until she got married. And uh...she fell down the stairs and killed herself and uh...I forget what, does it have it on there?

B: Nineteen...

GH: I believe it has...

B: Nineteen, seventy.

GH: Yeah. Uh-huh.

B: Okay. How old was she when she married? Do you know?

GH: When she married?

B: Uh-huh.

GH: I have no idea.

B: Okay.

GH: I have no idea.

B: Okay. How about your brother Robert?

GH: Robert, he just died, lets see, Kathryn, Robert, he just died the twentieth of the last December.

B: What did he do for a living?

GH: He was in insurance.

B: His insurance. And where was that?

GH: In Tamawakawa(?). Those were all in Tamawakawa(?).

B: Okay.

GH: All but Roland, he was, he was, worked down here.

B: All but six.

GH: And Charles.

B: And what did Charles do?

GH: He was, worked at the Atlas Powder Company for many, many years. Until he retired there.

B: And what did he do there?

GH: He was in one of the building, but I don't know if, taking uh...powderings and stuff.

B: Okay. What was this Atlas Powder? Was it gun powder, or?

GH: Yes and uh...caps for the mines and uh...they made uh...matches in long strips and they were used to detonate different things. They would, you know, they come off and uh... and they made shells. All different kinds of shells. I worked in the office in the morning. And then in the afternoon I worked, walked the board walk in taking care of all the different buildings.

B: And how old were you when you worked at this job?

GH: Oh I don't know, when the war was going on. What year was that?

B: We went in, in nineteen, seventeen. So it was nineteen, fourteen, to nineteen, eighteen.

GH: Well I guess that's uh...it was in the eighteen I guess, around nineteen, eighteen.

B: Ok, well we've got a couple more, how about Estil?

GH: Well she's married and lives in uh...uh...Georgia. Married a doctor and lives in Georgia.

B: And Leoda

GH: Leoda lives in Tamawkawa. She uh...is a widow. She lives in Tamawkawa.

B: Ok, and Junie and Rinn.

GH: Well now Junie, Rinn is one of the twins and he died, he died in uh...what is it nineteen, eighty-five.

B: Nineteen, eighty-five.

GH: Uh-huh and Junior's the only one living now, he's coming to visit me next weekend, next week. He and his wife.

B: Okay.

GH: That's a big family isn't it?

B: It sure is. Do you know how old your mother was when the twins were born?

GH: I have no idea. I was about sixteen years old when the twins were born. I was down in uh...Tamawkawa selling poppies.

B: Poppies?

GH: You know uh...on thirtieth of May, I mean yeah 30th of May. Memorial Day.

B: That was...

GH: And they used to sell a poppies down in town to make money. And my dad came and told me I'd better come home.

B: Did either, oh I'm sorry go ahead.

GH: No that's all.

B: Okay. Did either of your, any of your older brother fight during World War I?

GH: Robert.

B: Robert.

GH: Uh-huh.

B: Okay. Do you know anything about his service?

GH: No I don't know, I've, I should know a lot, but boy I've, I forget too much.

B: Okay. Well now that we've talked about your family, uh...lets get back to when you came here okay. You were working at the drug store. Did you...

GH: I got married when I come down, right after I come down here, but it didn't last long. Just uh...a few months.

B: And who were you married to?

GH: Reeve Spenner.

B: Reeve...

GH: Reece Spenner.

B: Okay.

GH: He was from Virginia.

B: Ok you were only married a few months.

GH: Uh-huh. I stayed uh...I didn't get a divorce for about uh...five years after that.

B: And how old were you then?

GH: Well I was twenty, I guess I was twenty-four, twenty-five. Seems a long time ago.

B: So, when did you meet Mr. Hatfield?

GH: When I come down here and in, and in the uh...working in the drug store.

B: When you came did people talk about anything thing that had happened in 1920 about Sid...

GH: No.

B: Nobody ever said anything?

GH: No. I think everybody was afraid to talk.

B: Did you and Mr. Hatfield have any children?

GH: No.

B: How were old you when you married him?

GH: I was married in '29 so I must, I was I guess thirty.

B: Okay. well basically what did you do in the drug store? Lets talk about your work in the drug store.

GH: Well it was just, they had a Silver Fountain, and they served sandwiches and the uh...served, just served. And of course I sold things, you know uh...medicine. But not uh...the uh... prescription.

B: Well, when you, when you got married did you get married in a church?

GH: No. We were married in Kentucky.

B: Who married you. Was it the Justice of the Peace?

GH: No, no it was a preacher uh...huh I was just thinking about it the other day and uh...what his name was Hewitt.

B: So Reverend Hewitt married you?

GH: Uh-huh.

B: Uh...did you go to church?

GH: Member of the Methodist Church.

B: Methodist Church.

GH: Uh-huh. I haven't been there for many years because I just don't get out and go. But I still claim.

B: Okay.

GH: And I pay you know I uh...sent, give a month. Uh...several times a year.

B: When you were younger did you go to church often?

GH: Never, hardly ever, well yeah when I was at home, we had to go to church and Sunday School, we were made to go to church and Sunday School. When I was in Pennsylvania, and then I come down here I got away from it for a while but in the nineteen, forties I got back in it for a while.

B: Why was that? Did you just...

GH: Well just got interested yeah. Uh-huh and uh...I took part in the church of course any of the church people can tell ya. We had good time, used to have good times together, but I don't get out any more.

B: What was the depression like in Matewan? Do you, were you working in the drug store?

GH: No I only worked there a little while, I went to uh...Shaffer Brothers and worked for there for uh...five years. Oh I guess six years, five or six years anyway, but uh...I don't know I uh...you know when your young uh...you don't think of those things. Now of course it's different because uh...so many other things to uh...to keep you pulling all the time to uh...know. And but when I, of course I could of found a lot about the Hatfield and McCoy, but I, I never bothered. I know that my uh....my uh...husband told me that his grandmother took meals to the place where they had these men and that's about the only thing that I know about it.

B: Was that the uh...the, during the feud or during?

GH: Uh-huh. During the Hatfield and McCoy feud. And of course then the uh...Felts when they killed all those, I wasn't here then you see. That was over to. So really I don't know anything about it.

B: Was there ever any union talk that you heard. Did you ever hear them talk about the union much?

GH: Uh-huh. I wasn't you know I wasn't interested in the union I didn't belong to uh...uh...union. And I wasn't interested in I guess, when you're young you know, you know your mind is on something else. Rather than on things that I guess I should have been listening to, but it was pretty close, people didn't talk too much, that I ever heard. Of course I worked, when we worked at Shaffer Brothers we went to work at eight o'clock, and there was no closing time, just uh...whenever the people stopped coming in at night. That's when you closed. It was from, from nine to five, or nine to four. You, you uh...went at eight o'clock and worked until sometimes eleven o'clock at night.

B: Did you make as much money as you...

GH: A hundred dollars a month.

B: Someone in town said that you and your husband Mr. Hatfield worked together, what was, did you own a restaurant or run a store?

GH: We first had a restaurant for thirteen years, restaurant and pool room for thirteen years.* Then we uh...went into the wholesale business, and we were in that until uh...1960 when we retired.

B: What was the name of your restaurant?

GH: Uh...what did we have, did we have a name. Isn't that awful? It's been so many years ago I've forgotten. Now the wholesale was Hatfield Wholesale.

B: Hatfield Wholesale.

GH: Uh-huh. It's in that building right next to the church. Down here, that's where we had it.

B: Who would come into your restaurant? Do you remember anybody in particular that used to come in all the time?

GH: Oh, uh...John McCoy, know John McCoy, do you know who John McCoy is? Ernest Ward, he's dead though, and uh...well everybody, everybody it was a local hangout for everybody would come in. Cora Chambers worked for us for a while, she's dead. Mrs. Isom worked for us for a while but she's dead too I think. You know all the older folks around here, there's not many left.

B: That's why we're trying to interview them, so that's why...

GH: Uh-huh.

B: What kind of person was, was John McCoy? He seems like a rather colorful character around town?

GH: Well really, I, I don't know, I don't know what I could say about him, we were always really good friends. He and Dewey and, and myself. Ernest Ward the same way. And uh...the Hoskins boys, of course there none of them around here any more. Hoskins family and uh...I don't know just there's so many that it would be hard to start talking about. Of course all my friends are dead. Henrietta McCoy, have you heard her name before?

B: No ma'am.

GH: Well she's dead. She was one of my best friends and her mother. And her uh...her mother, and her mother's sister were killed in an automobile accident. They were very good friends of mine and Mrs. Montgomery, I guess you've heard of her, the uh...school, used to be a school teacher, we were very good friends. She's dead, and uh...Goldie Simpkins, have you heard her name mentioned? Well we were very good friends uh...my girlfriend from Williamson come up here to spend the weekend with me (coughs) excuse me and uh...I was fixing dinner and I said Kathryn I'm gonna call Goldie and ask her to come up, and eat with us, and she did, she come up and we sit, ate she stayed quite a while, the next Sunday at the same time they were burying her.

B: Oh goodness.

GH: Uh-huh yeah.

B: Did you get to see your friends very often when you were younger? Did you all visit together?

GH: Well no we, everybody stayed busy, and uh...Henrietta had a store and she stayed busy, we, I was always in some kind of business. And of course, I, and I always worked with my husband, we always worked together, when the restaurant and the uh...and Wholesale we worked together all the time. And you didn't have much time, weekends sometime, but when we had the restaurant we were open on Sunday. But when we had the Wholesale of course we were closed on Sunday. But uh...the colored weren't allowed, when, when we first had restaurant they weren't allowed to eat in the restaurants. But I used to feed, they could go in the back and eat, or I could fix them food and they could take it out. But they weren't allowed to eat in there. But uh...I always got a long well with the colored folks. I treated them like they were people. Human beings.

B: Do you remember any, any of them that would come, do you, do you remember any of them their names?

G: Well they uh...Brown family down here they uh...now Johnny Fullen you know who he is, he was up here several weeks ago, we my niece from uh...up in Virginia was here and uh...wanted to know some things about what was going on. And she and we didn't know he was coming, he came up and we really enjoyed talking to him. Now Mary, the one that raised him, Mary Brown I guess you've heard about it. She raised many children, she raised many children. I don't think that she's very well now.

B: Were they orphans that she raised? or....

G: Uh...really I don't know where they all, but I'll tell you, she had, she was always raising, she raised this Johnny and a bunch of, I guess she got a some of them living there now, I don't know. 'Cause I never go down in town, I haven't been over in town uh...one time I guess in three years, that I have been over in town. I can't walk, and I don't have a car so you stay at home.

B: I talked to Mary Ward last week, and she said that one time a black minister was at a revival, Reverend Smith, did you ever hear of him? I believe he was a Baptist minister. That used to, he was also a miner.

GH: I don't, I don't remember, he was in the Baptist. Well I think Mary went to the Baptists Church for a while I don't know. I really don't remember. I have to watch that one in there, it doesn't come in this one but it does in that one, but it uh....good air here. I better close them.

GH: Why we uh...they would go you know year after year many times through year they would go and, and hunt and fish down there. He and his nephews. But uh...then in 1960 when he retired and he was in bad health then. And we didn't get to go too much. But after he died, this girlfriend of mine in Williamson, uh...uh...Bill Hogg was my lawyer and she his secretary, and that was how I met her, and uh...when I went down there, San, uh...Kathryn Sansom, so I then went to uh...up to uh...Washington, where my niece was then in Washington. I went up there in uh...Thanksgiving, and I stayed until February, no March. (thunder or some noise outside) And that will hurt that won't it?

B: That's why I unplugged it, now I'm running on batteries now.

GH: When I come back I had to go down and see the lawyer, and she told me that her husband had died while I was gone, and he died one year exactly to the day that my husband died.

B: Oh mercy.

GH: Uh-huh. And we had been friends ever since her husband, uh... Dewey's been dead twenty-five years in February, and her's was twenty-four years in February. And we've been friends ever since. She comes up here.

B: She comes to see you?

GH: Oh yes. She drives. She'll uh...she'll be eighty-six uh... Christmas Eve. So uh...but uh...she still drives, but I uh...sold the old car that I had, cause I hate to drive. Do you like to drive?

B: Not around here.

GH: Oh I've....

B: The roads aren't like back home like they are here.

GH: No, so uh...but she comes up quite often. Then she has a sister-in-law that uh...the three of us are good friends. But she had a stroke a little over a year ago. She was in Lexington until uh...lets see, she come home Friday, Saturday. But she's not allowed to drive or anything. So I talked to her this morning.

B: What do you remember about the floods here?

GH: Oh honey, I was never in one of them because I lived here. But our place was in, in flood, business. But we'd go down and I had uh...sixteen and eighteen people here in the seventy-seven flood and I had just got over a heart attack.

B: Oh goodness!

GH: Uh-huh. But uh...we made out. We had no water, no electricity, and no phones or anything, but I had a little Coleman stove and that's what we cooked on. And we had took this, we took these cushions and the cushions off of the other and put them down on the floor and made beds, and I have three bedrooms, and the one bed has two mattresses on it. Took one of those off and put it down so people could sleep. And uh...we made it.

B: That's good.

GH: But it was something. To uh...cook for all of them, and then of course they built once in a while, they'd bring stuff from down at the emergency breakfast, they'd bring it up sometime for us. We made it.

B: When you and your husband would go to Tennessee, how did you go?

GH: We went to Pikeville, and uh...through uh...Jenkins and uh...Tazewell.

B: Did you drive or take a train?

GH: Oh yeah, yeah.

B: You drove. What kind of vehicle did you have? Was it a car or truck?

GH: We had uh...well when the pace of business we had a car and a truck. But uh...to go to Tennessee, we always went in the, we had a Cadillac. Then Kathryn and I, after uh...uh...our husbands died, we'd go down there every year. Several after she retired why we'd go down there several times a year. But they kept on breaking in and it was a beautiful place. It was all Chinese Chestnut in the inside and had electric heat and it was beautiful. And we'd go down, maybe, three times a year or more. But they broke in, around, I guess about four times. The last time I went down, it was in such a mess. It was awful where they had broke in so I had to sell it. Couldn't get uh...insurance or anything when your not living there. So I had to sell it and we miss going down there. But those things come. Oh this is what we've been looking for.

B: The rain. Um...lets see did you have any hobbies when you...

GH: Oh honey, don't you see all my hobbies there, all over there and in through the house, I'll show you. I uh...do needle point, I crochet, you see this?

B: Uh-huh. How did you learn to, to, to do needle point, and crochet? Did your mother teach you or?

GH: Well my sis, I was down Florida visiting my sister when she lived in Florida, and she got me in it, so uh...I made two beautiful pocketbooks and uh...I had to send them away to have them made after I uh...did they work. And I must have fourteen maybe fourteen pieces that uh...but you can't find anybody to block them around here. And crochet, I guess I've made a hundred or more afghans already and pillows, and I have some pillows in there, lap robes, scarves, hats, just anything. But uh...my hands were always, were always busy. But I uh...I did a little crocheting uh...be four weeks ago.

B: Do you remember the first time you saw a radio or a television or anything like that?

GH: I've got the first television that we ever bought in there.

B: Oh really.

GH: Uh-huh.

B: How old is it?

GH: Oh well they first came out, I just don't know old it is. I, I don't, I don't have the least idea. Boy look at it going out of that hollow there. And of course uh...when I was a young girl at home for many years we had uh...we always had water in the house, but uh...it was a long time before we got a bathroom, and uh... light, electricity we used the coal oil lamps.

B: Did...

GH: You never saw those.

B: No...

GH: And we had to keep them shinning. Cooked on a coal stove then. And I think it's still in the old home place.

B: Where you grew up, your home place, was it in town or was it on a.....

GH: Oh yes, in town yeah, yeah it was in town. Uh-huh.

B: What did your father do for the railroad?

GH: He was a brakeman.

B: He was a brakeman Do you know where he would travel when...

GH: Well uh...when they'd go out to a new berry run is what they call it. They had uh...uh...box about that big, lunch box and they had to put enough stuff in that to last as long as they were gone.

B: How, how long would he stay gone?

GH: Well sometimes three day.

B: Three days?

GH: Uh-huh. And they cooked and ate in the caboose that's where they uh...did. But uh...

B: Was he from your home town? Is that where his home was?

GH: Yeah, yes his mother and father were both from Germany, but he was, he was born in Tamawkawa.

B: Did he ever tell you where in Germany that they were from?

GH: Hut-un.

B: Did he speak any German?

GH: My dad?

B: Uh-huh.

GH: Yes.

B: Did he talk to you in German?

GH: No, no he would talk to his mother and father. I used to know a little German but I, you know when, when you get away from it, it's gone. But uh...we'd go to church on Sunday morning and uh... the service in High German.

B: High German.

GH: Uh-huh. We didn't know what they were talking about but we had to go.

B: What, what religion was that?

GH: St. John's Reformed Church. I was confirmed there, and uh... on the seventieth year* that I had been confirmed my brother died, and we went to the uh...church after he was buried and we had communion down in their basement. Seventy years after I had been, we had...

B: How old were you when you were confirmed?

GH: Sixteen.

B: Sixteen?

GH: Uh-huh.

B: What was that ceremony about?

GH: Well we went to uh...a catechism instruction and we had to learn you know about the Bible and uh...around Easter when we were taken into the church the preacher would ask us different uh...uh...you know ask us questions and we had to know the answer. It was in the uh...I still have a little, a little book like that. The seventieth anniversary and you had to know the answers for it. That seems like yesterday.

B: Do you remember any of the questions that he would ask?

GH: No I don't. No.

B: Did you have to answer in German, or were they....

GH: Oh no, no, no, it was, no it was all, the morning services were all in English. Just the night was service was in uh...in uh High German. Sunday school was at nine o'clock, from nine'tilten and then church is from ten 'til eleven I believe it was the way it was. Eleven to twelve I guess it was, but we had to go to Sunday school and church that was one thing. My mother never get to go cause she had one baby after the other but uh...we had to go.

B: Who would take you?

GH: We walked honey.

B: You walked?

GH: And it was a long, long distance too. And going to school was the same way. We'd go to school and uh...we'd get out of school for lunch, we had to walk home, and it was a long way. From one end, from one end part of the town to the other. I was, we lived up in the north ward and the south, no in the south ward and we had to walk to the east ward. And go home and eat and go back to school then.

B: How big was your school?

GH: Oh it was big, big school. Yeah big school. But uh...I quit when I was sixteen. I had, my dad had to take me to the superintendent before I could quit.

B: Why did you quit?

GH: Wanted to go to work.

B: Wanted to go to work?

GH: Uh-huh.

B: How many grades were there at that school?

GH: Oh there were all just like it is now. But you know it was a funny thing then uh...married women weren't allowed to teach then.

B: Why was that?

GH: I don't know. But if they were married they, they had to quit, if they were married they had to quit teaching, but uh...as long as they didn't marry they could teach. I think they can teach now, but then when I went to school....and there was no cafeteria or anything. You, you walked home to eat.

B: Do you remember any of your teachers?

GH: Oh there was a redheaded beautiful woman, um...I can't think of her name. There was one of them, she was a wonderful old person. And uh...what was the other, I don't remember any of the young, the uh...but....the two of them I re, the last two that I was under I remember but I, I just forget their names now. Martha, Martha, I should know it, but I don't I've forgotten it.

B: Some people remember when say World War II or World War I the day the War ended. Do you remember?

GH: Yes. uh...everybody wanted to go to town, you know to celebrate.

B: Is this World War I or...

GH: Yeah, uh-huh, yeah. And everybody went to uh...to down in the main part of town to cel....just celebrate, not, there wasn't a... you know it wasn't like it is now. It wasn't drunks and carrying on and dope and stuff...........

B: Uh-huh.

GH: .......then...you didn't see it and I..I.. use to go..we use to go to dances and there wasn't no drinking and carrying on.....

B: Uh-huh.

GH: But uh......time changes.

B: Did the uh...did the flu epidemic come to where were living..

GH: Oh yes...Oh yeah...Yeah I helped take of the family and I remember Mother after Mother got up and uh...I just kept on going and she told me to go up stairs and get something and uh...I did and I didn't come back down and she come back down she come up to see and I had after I..I passed out and I just was pretty bad but I got over it....but oh I tell you they...they had the armories full of it and uh...people...some of 'em...I had a friend that uh...died...that when she had a little baby and they laid the baby with her uh-huh...and they're buried together. It's just...it was terrible then.

B: When did it come to where you lived..was it in the winter or do you remember?

GH: I don't remember now...when it was...I don't remember.....I should remember things but I...I don't I guess you forget some things (laughing).

B: I think I forget more than you do. Uh Let's see....you say there was a lady doctor that would come sometimes?

GH: Doctor Maude and her husband.

B: Doctor Maude and her husband.

GH: Uh-hum. Doctor Mau...I don't know what their last name was but we always called her Doctor Maude.

B: Do you know anything about her...did you....

GH: No they delivered the twins and the one twins arm was broken I remember that.

B: When..when it was born?

GH: When it was born uh-huh...yeah see they were born at home then you know they didn't go to a hospital then....I remember my aunt coming over after the twins were born and she started..when she was in the room with mother and she started crying and mother asked her why she was crying she said, "Oh Katie (they called her Katie) said, you've had some many and now having two more (laughing)." It just seems like yesterday.

B: Did your mother say anything about was it different trying to take care of two for her.

GH: No...I uh..I just helped with it all the time I was just so proud of those two ba...boys uh...when I'd come in from work on a Saturday I'd get 'em dres..., after they could walk, I'd get 'em dressed take 'em down in town so proud to show them off, they were beautiful uh-hum...we were a very close family, very close...

B: Were there...Oh I'm sorry...

GH: Just the four, just four of us left of out eleven.

B: Just four out of eleven.

GH: Uh-huh. And we don't get to see each other very often. My sister from down in uh...Georgia come up last year. And uh... spent three or four days with me. She and my niece in Virginia came, they were here together. And then uh...my sister's daughter form up in Virginia, or up in Ohio she came down and spent some time with me last, last year too. They're all good to me.

B: Uh-huh. Well, good. Did you ever go to the movies in your home town?

GH: Yeah we use to go uh...uh...once in a while not too often. Cause when there is a big family you don't have a lot of money to go out and go, but uh...after we started working and uh...we'd go once in a while, not too often. Right now, I haven't been but, but to one movie in twenty years.

B: Do you remember what the movie was that you went to see?

GH: It was up in uh...in Washington, was "My Fair Lady".

B: "My Fair Lady". Since you did belong to a big family what would you all do say in the evenings or when your father would come home?

GH: Well in, in the kitchen we had a great big long table, it had, in one side we had a big long bench you know. And uh...then of course chairs around, and we'd sit around and uh...I never played cards, well, but they use to play cards and uh...until I come down here then I started playing cards. And uh...uh...we just, mother played the piano and we'd get around and sing, and uh...we'd just have a big time together with the family. Never big, never fights or anything between us we were always congenial with each other. So those things just don't seem far away.

B: Well uh...if you don't mind I want to ask you some names, and, and, and if you have anything to say about em' or if you don't want to that's fine. I'm just gonna ask some name because I'm new here so, how about lets see go on back, uh...how about Ernest Ward?

GH: I'd rather not say anything.

B: Rather not say anything. Ok uh...lets see how about...

GH: I guess you already know that he and Dewey had trouble?

B: No I didn't.

GH: Well just, I'd rather not say anything.

B: They didn't get along?

GH: They did at the end.

B: Ok, how about Noah Floyd?

GH: Who?

B: Noah Floyd.

GH: Noah?

B: Noah Floyd.

GH: Was he from around here?

B: Uh-huh.

GH: In Matewan?

B: Uh-huh. I think he was a political figure. I'm not sure. Johnny Owens?

GH: That's from down in Williamson. I don't know those people.

B: Ok, did you follow politics much here?

GH: Uh...no. I haven't voted in I don't know when.

B: Did you vote though when you were younger?

GH: Well when I come down here I did but not while I was in Pennsylvania I didn't. I wasn't old, old enough. I was but I never did until I come down here and then I started voting but I haven't voted now in quite a few years.

B: Did you talk to your husband around election time or did you keep it private?

GH: He voted for who he wanted to and I voted for who I wanted to. I'm a Republican.

B: Oh you are.

GH: And he was to so, of course if, if we wanted to change over it was alright, but uh...we're both Republicans. And anybody from Pennsylvania, almost. Of course Dewey was born and raised here.

B: What, what was the voting process did you, was there uh...uh... machine that you used or did you right a ballot or...

GH: A what?

B: How did you vote when you voted what would you do to vote?

GH: Well uh...in the later it was just uh...machines but then we'd have the town election you just went in a little place and just wrote down who wanted, I mean put a little x beside their name that you wanted. But I uh...I never, I didn't vote uh...I voted for man if, it would go on one side or the other who I ever I thought I'd rather do. Before, but uh...I never took part in I sort of one time an elec...election officer for the town election I uh...I worked, Robert McCoy had, he was mayor then he had me to work but that was the only time I took part in it.

B: How long have you known uh...Robert McCoy?

GH: He wasn't born yet when, (laughing) when I come down here, that's how long I've known him. See his mother was Henrietta, and uh...Robert and David and uh...Ramona the daughter. See his, I shouldn't say anything about. But we have been friends for many years, many, many, many years. Robert's a good man.

B: He was the one that told me that you might be able to tell us about the buildings down town. He said if anybody could remember it was you.

GH: Well uh...they had, I don't know when I think about all the uh...different stores that there were in town here and the doctors that, that we've had in town here, it, it was just something, I'll tell you.

B: Can you, can you remember anything about the doctors, could you?

GH: Uh...I ought to re...remem....Doctor Hodge, in later years he had the hospital down here, and uh...what was the other doctors name that we, I helped him with a birth. I know as well as I know my own name and can't think of it. But we uh...uh...a girlfriend of mine was having a baby and uh...he was a doctor and Cora Chambers and I helped him. What was his name, Doctor um...his wife's still living and I hear from her every now and then she's down North Carolina I believe, that's Tennessee. Um...I can't remember.

B: Was Cora Chambers related to the Chambers that were involved in the Matewan Massacre do you know?

GH: Uh...she married a Chambers.

B: Oh she married a Chambers.

GH: She married a Cha...she married...she's married to Hallie Chambers, and I don't know whether he had anything to do with it or not. He used to work in the mines, so maybe he was, I don't know. I was trying to think of all the different uh...stores in town, now I told you, Sanders didn't I? A grocery store.

B: Do you, can you remember where any of these stores were?

GH: When I, uh...lets see uh...what, Sanders was down uh...next to where the uh...hotel building, it was in the hotel building, I, I believe is there a liquor store there now I believe. And what'd I say the other mans name was?

B: I tell you had uh...Leckie's?

GH: Leckie's Drug Store. Uh...lets see what's there now. Leckie's that's across from where Robert has his place. Across the street there where Robert has his uh...insurance office. And what was the other store that I gave you?

B: Shaffers.

GH: Uh-huh. Well it was you know where Nenni's store, well it was the next store above them.

B: How about Compton's Grocery?

GH: Well that was where uh...I don't know whether there was a place, uh...the Rupple's used to have it down in town there.

B: Okay.

GH: You know where uh...do you know where that is?

B: No ma'am.

GH: Rupple's had uh...restaurant or a beer joint there or something. And I don't what, I don't know what's in it now. Cause I don't go down town I don't know.

B: How about Claire Overstreet?

GH: Well now he was up, up, up in the upper end of town for a while. But I uh...

B: How about Testerman's? The jewelry store.

GH: Well now that's where Robert is now.

B: Okay.

GH: Uh-huh. And Hope's Department Store was next to the drug store, uh...below the drug store, so that's across from where Robert is to, I don't know what's in there now. In that building. Then the uh...Ho...Hope's uh...store uh...after that one was closed then the son had one, and I believe there's uh...furniture store in there now on the other side of the street. Is that, do you know where that is?

B: Yes ma'am.

GH: Well now that's uh...that used to be Hope's

GH: furniture store, and in to the building next to that used to be the Post Office. What's in there now at the corner there?

B: The bank. Is that the bank?

GH: No the bank's, bank's across the street.

B: Oh....

GH: Well maybe they have a place over.

B: Ok we're talking about the store down town. And you were talk-ing about the uh...hard ware store.

GH: Yeah uh...Chambers hardware store, uh...you know where Robert has his, no it's not Robert's store any more. The restaurant down there who?

B: The Chatterbox, is that?

GH: Is that the Chatterbox?

B: It's...

GH: Well now uh...the hardware store used to be between the post office and uh...and that brick building, and now before that brick building was built there was all wood buildings in there, and uh... John Brown had a place there, there used to be several restaurants in there, but I just forget the name. Well it burned down, that place burned down, and there was a little baby burned, a little colored baby burned up in that, in that building.

B: In John Brown's building....

GH: Yeah. Gaylethia was the name of the mother.

B: Do you remember about what time this was, I mean what year?

GH: I may, that might have been uh...around twen...between '25 and '29 you know I just don't know exactly. I had some of the picture, but I gave them to the uh...church. I had taken pictures...

B: And the church has them?

GH: Uh-huh.

B: Do you remember when John McCoy ran the bus station, do you remember ever going in there?

GH: The bus station.

B: I think there was a bus station. Do you remember there being a bus station in town?

GH: I can't remember, I wish I could say I did, but I don't. It sounds familiar but I, I just can't uh...place it. Is there any other buildings that you uh...know of that you uh...

B: Just whatever, I, I haven't been around town much, so that's why we're trying to uh...what has been down there.

GH: Well the Nenni's store uh...the Shaffer Brothers was between uh...on this side of the Nenni's store. I don't know what's in there now, whether the Nenni's took it over or not. I'll tell you, I just can't tell you much about the Matewan now.

B: Well you've told us a lot about the, the early years.

GH: Yeah.

B: Uh...I'm going to ask you a question and you don't have to answer it, uh...we've talked some about the blacks in the community, did you ever hear anything about their being a Ku-Klux-Klan group here, you never heard anything.

GH: No the blacks and we all, always got a long very well. But there's a lot of people that don't.

B: Uh-huh.

GH: But not me. I had a colored girl working for me for many years, Maggie Sanders. She's dead now.

B: What did she do for you?

GH: Clean house.

B: Clean house.

GH: Uh-hum. I always did my own cooking and taking care. I use to do all my own painting.

B: Painting the house?

GH: Not the outside, the inside, always, always did my own painting. But now I'm not allowed to get up on ladders. So uh...I don't know what else I could...

B: How did you paint your house, I mean did you paint it certain colors?

GH: Yeah I used to have different colors in each room, but I don't do that any more. You want a good, I'll take you through when we're uh...and you can see it.

B: Okay.

GH: But uh...when we bought this place uh...well you wouldn't think it was the same place now. This was just a big porch here and we had all of this extended. And we had the uh...car port and all that put in there, and uh...we did a lot to it you wouldn't know it was the same...it was the same place.

B: Did you and your husband own that building the, the wholesale where you had your wholesale? Do you remember how much you paid for that building was?

GH: I believe was it seven...I know we sold it for seven thousand.

B: When was that?

GH: Hum?

B: When, when did you sell it?

GH: About, well after we went out of business it stay...stayed there for a while, and uh...I just don't remember, I guess maybe uh...'61 maybe something like that. And I think the preacher and them paid about twenty-eight thousand dollars for it, but we sold it for seven, don't...oh you better not...oh it's on there...I shouldn't have said that.

B: Was it built for you and your husband?

GH: No, no, hunt-uh...not. We bought it off of Milt Williamson.

B: What was it before you bought it? Do you remember?

GH: Well I, I think that it's uh...Milt had it uh...uh...feed store there too. But we, we sold everything, we sold everything, meats and flower, and meal, candy, just everything, we sold everything. Can goods, cow feed, chicken feed,

B: Did you ever have a garden or did you buy all your food?

GH: We had to buy it. Have no, I didn't have time I was at work, I worked all the time. We always worked together. So I didn't have time, he, they was born and raised on the farm on the Kentucky side, you know where the tunnel is down there?

B: Yes ma'am.

GH: Well uh...they owned from the tunnel up, quite a bit of land down...three hundred and some acres I think it was. That's where he was born.

B: Did he ever tell you about his family?

GH: I can't say.

B: Okay. People around here know. They're all dead. So you, you don't want to say who his parents were?

GH: Oh I, I didn't know the father, the father was dead when I came here. Uh...Lettie and Roland Hatfield was there names. And they had eight children. But they're all dead. There's several grandchildren. Cricket and Berry Hatfield uh...Betty Jane, Wendal, uh...Margaret, uh...lets see Blanch, Margaret, and uh...hum...isn't that awful? Elizabeth, and George Wagners daughter, that's grandchildren. That's uh...the grandchildren.

B: That's the grandchildren. Do you know what your father's father did for an occupation? Did he...

GH: No.

B: Did you ever know about any bootlegging that went on in this area? I've heard people talk about there where people that would bootleg.

GH: Oh they, I guess they were all around. They'd call it white lightning. Now up this hollow up here there used to be a coal mine.

B: So they'll know on the tape, that's Warm Hollow, right?

GH: Uh-huh.

B: Okay.

GH: Warm Hollow.

B: Do you know any men that worked up in this mine?

GH: I think Hallie Chambers was one of them and his dad maybe, Uncle Jim, I don't know. What was the name of that coal company?

B: I've heard somebody mention Jim Chambers, did you know him?

GH: Oh Uncle Jim yeah. Not my uncle but that's what we always called, that's Hallie's father and uh...they had uh...quite a big family too, but uh...uh...I don't know how many of them are living. None of them around here anymore. One of the girls came to see me not, uh...several months ago, she lives up in Bluefield. But uh... I just don't know where all the children are. Any other names that you can think of?

B: Uh...lets see, well, I'll go back to some of the people uh... that were in about nineteen-twenty how about Sid Hatfield, did any-body ever say anything about him to you?

GH: Na...I think...No uh...that's the uh...I didn't know...I knew his wife but uh...I didn't know him.

B: You knew Jessie?

GH: Hum...

B: Did you know Jessie?

GH: No his uh...uh...what was the first one you ask about? Sid Hatfield?

B: Sid Hatfield.

GH: Now he was married to uh...Miss Starr. She was a Miss Starr. What was her first name? Um...

B: Was it Sally?

GH: Uh-huh.

B: Sally Chambers.

GH: Yeah.

B: Now, she was married to Ed Chambers.

GH: Ed Chambers, Ed Chambers, that's right yeah.

B: You knew her?

GH: Oh yeah. Yeah she'd been to my house here. Yeah, but she's dead though now. I believe.

B: That's what we've heard, we're, we're trying to find information on it.

GH: I believe that uh...that she's dead.

B: What kind of person was she?

GH: Beautiful.

B: Now, now the story...

GH: She married uh...another man but I just forget, they were both here, but I just forget what his name was, he was an older man. And I think he might been...

B: Harold Houston?

GH: Yes. Yeah, that's it. You've got a better memory than I have.

B: No, I just the stories are recent for me. Everybody's been telling me...

GH; Yeah, yeah. Yeah they've both been here.

B: The story goes that when Ed was shot that she hit one of the people that shot him with her umbrella, was she that kind of person?

GH: I don't know that, I don't know that.

B: Did she ever talk to you about what happened with...

GH: No, hum-uh...

B: What was Mr. Houston like?

GH: Well he was a very well educated man to my opinion. I think that, what did he do, I forget was he a lawyer? I don't remember, was he a lawyer?

B: Yes ma'am.

GH: He was a nice looking man. I didn't know, you know I just knew him by coming here. And, and uh...spending a few hours is all, but him, her of course I knew a long time ago. But Mr. Houston I didn't just when he came here to the house. And I think he came one time down at the place of the business and talked to Dewey, when he had the place down there.

B: Somebody said that he was a union lawyer and that he was a communist. Did you ever know anything?

GH: I never knew anything about that, no I never heard that.

B: Do you know how they met?

GH: No, I have no idea.

B: Okay.

GH: Now she has a brother Carl Starr, I don't know whether he's still living or not. He used to be I believe over in Charleston or some place over there, but I haven't heard anything from him in years so I don't know whether he's still alive or not.

B: Can you think of anybody around here that you think would be good narrators for our project? People that we could interview.

GH: You know just like I said the old people are all gone, and, and of course Frank Allara, but he's not in shape I guess to tell, course he might have told before he uh...(coughs) excuse me. But uh...he you know he got out and went, he could tell you a lot. But I don't know whether he can. Have you seen him?

B: They've, they've talk....

GH: And they've talked....

B: before he was, before he was sick..

GH: Well I just wondered uh-huh. So they might of got a lot of information from him I don't know.

B: Well is there anything that, that you'd like to talk about today, that, that I haven't asked you?

GH: I don't know of anything. I just sorry I don't remember, I know when I first came here there was no roads, uh...it was all mud. You had to cross the street in, in big ruts you know. And we'd put ashes across the street to make a path.

B: Were there sidewalks like there are now in front of the stores?

GH: Well some. Some, but uh...it was a muddy, muddy place if, if you had to go to Williamson, and you get in a rut.

B: So, when, when you first came where there two streets of buildings or was there just the one....

GH: Oh both, both sides. Yeah uh-huh.

B: Something I've been curious about was there on the street that was closest to the railroad tracks, did, were they double fronts, I mean could you go into....

GH: Yes...

B: the store on either side?

GH: Uh-huh.

B: Okay.

GH: Lord, we used to have trains going through here, you could go to Williamson just about any time you wanted, or go any place you wanted. There was all kinds of trains. Of course now the automobile has taken the place of it. It's hard to get out of Matewan now.

B: Did you ever travel on the train?

GH: Oh yes, when I'd go to Pennsylvania, I always traveled on the train.

B: How did uh...

GH: I'd get on here and go to uh...Roanoke and change in Roanoke and then go into Philadelphia or in, uh...then back home.

B: How far was your home town from Pennsy...I mean from Philadelphia?

GH: About eighty miles.

B: West or East? How?

GH: I guess you would say it's, its' West or North of Phil...North of Philadelphia I guess. North of Philadelphia. Do you know anything about Pennsylvania?

B: No ma'am.

GH: You don't. Well have you heard of Pottsville Pennsylvania, or Hazelton.

B: No ma'am.

GH: Well uh...Tamawkawa was just about uh...fourteen and sixteen miles from either place.

B: How much did it cost for you to go to uh...your hometown when you rode on the train?

GH: Well I know from here to, to uh...Roanoke was six dollars and something, but I don't remember what it was from there on. But I remember it was around six dollars. A little over maybe, but I don't remember from there on in.

B: Were there sleeper cars, or did...

GH: Oh yes you could get sleep if you'd want to uh-huh. I don't know how many trains went through here, there must have been at least six or six uh...or more everyday, passenger trains go through here. This was a busy little town.

B: It was?

GH: Yes it was. Yeah. See Red Jacket was a big thing then, and Thacker was a big...Vulcan was a big place, a big uh..uh...mine, my brother worked in Vulcan for a while, and he worked at Sprigg, and uh...

B: And what did he do when he worked at those places?

GH: In the office.

B: Office.

GH: Office. Uh-huh.

B: For the coal companies?

GH: Uh-huh. B: Was he working for a coal company when you came?

GH: Yes. Uh-huh. That was up in uh...Caples.

B: Caples.

GH: Right outside of Welch.

B: Was he uh...office manager or a clerk or do you remember?

GH: I never have, never heard, but he, they say he was uh...a great office man, I've heard that many times, but I, I don't know.

B: Did he ever say anything about the union or what was going on?

GH: No, never. Now he married Dewey's sister.

B: He did?

GH: Uh-huh. Pearlie.

B: And that was Roland right?

GH: Uh-huh, Roland.

B: Was this after you and, and Dewey were married?

GH: Oh no, no, no that was before. They were living at Caples when I come down here to visit, and I never went back.

B: Is that how you met your husband? Was through them.

GH: Uh-huh.

B: When you were, were younger did women wear make-up or jewelry what, what was acceptable for a young lady to wear?

GH: Yeah uh...not no, you never saw eye shadow, or you know uh...I never did mak.....use much make-up when I, and now I don't have any on at all, but uh...usually a little rouge, or uh...lip stick and a little powder, but I never did use to much of it. That was more of what people just, rouge and powder and lip stick was all but now it's that brown stuff they put on their face and...

B: How about your health has, has your health been good all your life?

GH: Well yeah, can't complain. Good Lord let me live all this time. I'm just now getting over a bad case of I guess it was uh... pneumonia, but I've doctored it myself, but boy I'll tell you I went through three weeks of it.

B: I'll bet.

GH: Then I had the heart attack in nineteen, seventy-six right before the flood. And I still have spells with my heart. But I've been lucky to live this long.

B: Now I want to ask some personal questions that you know you don't have to answer um...cause people have been getting interested in women's histories so, so they ask questions now that a lot of people wouldn't think they'd ask but um...did, when you would go to the doctor when you were younger did you talk about you know women's personal health concerns, did you talk about that with the doctor or just...

GH: Really I never had much to do with doctors when I was young, I had my tonsils taken out beside that about all and then uh...I remember I set up, I went by myself, I was working and after I got through with work I went to the doctors office and sit up in front of him and that's how he took my tonsils out.

B: Oh really, how old were you then?

GH: I guess I was about eighteen.

B: And why were they taken out do you know?

GH: Well they were uh...giving me a lot of trouble.

B: Did he, did he use any anaesthetic on you?

GH: Yeah, the way they did it then, I, I don't know what they do now, but he had big clamps and he clamped on, on the uh...tonsil and he cut, cut the tonsil out, and when he got one done, oh I said I'll come back for the next one, and he said no, and I was starting to get sick then, but uh...uh...he took the other one out and uh...uh...they put me on a couch, and then he took me home.

B: He took you home?

GH: Uh-huh. I couldn't of got home without a way.

B: When you came to Matewan did you live by yourself?

GH: I stayed uh...I board at this house with George and Maude Wagner. When I first came, then I moved from here to the hotel and I stayed in the hotel until we got married.

B: Did people ever say anything to you about living in the hotel and being unmarried?

GH: Hunt-um. No there were nice people around the hotel.

B: How much...

GH: Mr. and Mrs. Lambert used to run the hotel. And I lived there it was nice. I paid fifty dollars a month.

B: A month?

GH: Uh-huh. Out of my hundred dollars that I earned. Yeah. Then after they, after the Lamberts gave it up the Buskirks had it. Mrs. Buskirk and her two daughters, Inez and...and I was there for a while they had it. What was the other girls name? Inez, they used to come to my room, I can't think of her name now. The de...they're re all dead too I think. I guess you've heard their names mentioned before haven't...

B: Yes ma'am. Did you have a room there?

GH: Uh-huh. And then I ate uh...you had, you had to go to the other, to the bathroom you know you didn't have a bath to your own room. And uh...bathroom. And then three meals a day. And I run the hotel and, and Dewey run the hotel for about a year, year and a half. But I didn't like that so we gave it up and went back into the restaurant business.

B: Well since we've talked quite a while today what I'm gonna do is leave you a business card and if you think of anything I'd like to come back and talk to you again, you know later...

GH: You live right up here...

B: I live right up there, and I'll come and talk to you again.

Matewan Oral History Project Collection