TRANSCRIPTION
What was it like during the Great Depression?
Well, it was rough time. I was luckier than a lot of people because my mother had an apartment house and even though my father was dead and she had my brother and I she had an apartment house so I never knew what it was like to go hungry. I had a roof over my head and at that time there was a lot of people that was in that position you know, you could go to the movies for 5 or 10 cents or you could save the tops out of milk bottles from the milk company there and you get 5 of them you could get in the show free, so you would see all of this stuff on news reels, that's the only way you could see what was going on in the country other than hearing news on the radio. We didn't have TVs back then you was lucky if you had a radio. But it was hard. There was a lot of hobos. You would see bread lines, people hungry and I can remember a lot of people that come into the door asking mama if they can work. Anything just to get something to eat and she was a good hearted person. A lot of times maybe it wasn't a lot but if she had anything she could spare she'd always give 'em something to eat. It wasn't anything except cold biscuits maybe some left over bacon from breakfast she'd give them what she could, but we were lucky that you know I never knew what it was to do without or anything like that but it was rough. It was very hard time."Back then we rationed things like food, gas, and even tires." "The rationing was partly because of the war." "This was during the war and these were hard times." She states that "Eisenhower said that he grew up poor, but he didn't know it because everyone was poor."
What types of jobs were available for women when you were old enough to get a job?
Well, uh a lot of women worked at drug stores, or behind food counters, or behind the cosmetic counters, but my first job was at Kresses Five and Dime in Corpus and I'd work on Saturdays.
What was Kresses?
It was a five and ten cent store. They had ribbons and everything kinda like a dollar store. It was like a Wal-Mart on a smaller scale. But women could buy under things and you could buy handkerchiefs, candy and most of them had like drugs stores they'd have a little bar where you could get a sandwich or a coke or something like that. And I worked at a counter that sold lady's underwear. (laughs) And another time I worked were they sold uh ribbons and lace, all that type of stuff.
How old were you when your mother died?
Uh, Let's see I was uh she died in '44 so I would have turned 16 in October '43 I turned 16 and she died January of '44 so I was 16.
How did your life change once she died? Was it different?
Oh yeah it was a drastic difference. It was during the war and my brother was already in the navy and uh he was serving on the Lexington. the first Lexington when it sank and uh my step dad was with the Texas oil company and he worked in a oil field about 50 miles from where we lived so it was just mom and I there were we lived and he'd come home on weekends. So when she died you know, he couldn't leave me there, I was too young to be left alone and uh so he had to put me in a private school. He put me in a private school in Laredo and it was called the holding institute. There were some girls in the nearby town that was also there they board there they go to school. So there was about 3 or 4 of us in a dormitory room. They had 2 bunk beds in there. You know I was 16 years old all of the sudden I'm on my own and in a strange place you know and it was rough. It was hard to adjust to that and you don't really realize how much you really depend on your parents till there taken away and then it really is hard, but I don't know in one way I think it makes you grow up quicker, I think it makes you stronger, and more self reliant. You come face to face with the fact that in this world you have to take care of yourself, you can't always have someone to lean on.
Did other people treat you differently once she died?
Uh, some did. You know some had this ah this feel of oh I'm so sorry kind of feeling and that I did not want anybody to feel pity for me because and I was fortunate I had uh in the little town where we lived I had a girl friend she was a little older than me, she and I were very close and I was very close with her family, and her mother and daddy were wonderful to me after mama died. And on weekends a lot of times with other kids we'd leave to go spend the weekend with somebody I would go get a bus and I would go spend the weekend with them. So but uh they treated me just like one of the kids you know and heaven only knows what I'd a done without them cause they were just like family to me, and my step dad was in a position where he couldn't do it you know he worked way off down there and so it was different but like I say I learned that I had to learn to make decisions, sometimes they weren't always good ones but you learn from it you know and you'll do it all your life. After I finished college I came to San Antonio with my friend who was my roommate, until she got desperately ill and had to move back home. She met Philip W Handley Jr. in 1947 and later that year they married on October 2nd. You're gonna find out you'll make decisions all your life that you'll turn around and say Holly Molly Why did I make that decision? So, but you know you learn.
How did women stand in society?
Well at that time back when I was growing up the majority of women were home makers. There was a lot of single girls when I was growing up. Mama had this apartment house that up on the top floor she had some single rooms and she rented those out to working girls that's all she had up stairs was working girls. Some worked for the telephone company. This was in the old days when they had the old switchboards so when you picked up the phone the operator said "Number please?" And I wish sometimes they had that still instead of these dumb machines. We had telephone operators. There were several other girls that lived there that were uh waitresses some worked at small restaurants and some of them worked at the hotel coffee shops and uh they didn't make a lot. I mean people back in the depression days a lot of them was making 6.50, 7 bucks a week salary and their tips. But the tips back in those days was maybe a dime. You know you don't go to a restaurant now and give a dime they would throw you out! You'd have to fight your way out. Back then salaries where low but there weren't opportunities for women back then like they are now and women married young and had kids but it's a lot better now for women now then it was back then. The war changed that a lot. When the war started that's when the women really took to the workforce and they went in to replace men in every job imaginable. And you know what they did a good job. They proved that they could do things just as good as men could.
Was your husband in the military during the war?
Yes he was in fact he was in the Marine Corps before the war started. He went in I think at 39 and he was in for about 18 months or something before they finally discovered he had flat feet. And in the Marine Corps you can't have flat feet. So they could get him a military discharge from the marines because of his feet, but then when pearl harbor came along the army said hey buddy we need you flat feet and all! So he went in the army and they made him because of his marine training they made him a drill sergeant at fort Sam. And he was a drill sergeant out there for quite a while before he went overseas. Philip held many jobs in his life including an air craft mechanic at Brooks Field, a switchman for the Missouri Pacific Railroad, a heavy equipment operator, and worked construction. He was also in the Marine Corps, then joined the Army and was in WWII. He was a Sergeant in the Seventh Armored Division in the Battle of the Bulge and received a Purple Heart. After I graduated from high school I went to a business college in Laredo where I took secretarial courses and learned to be a bookkeeper. My brother Marvin joined the navy in August of 1941 at the age of 17. He survived his term in the Battle of Coral Sea in the South Pacific against the Japanese and the U.S. Navy. Later he was on the USS Lexington when it sank. He had a leave of absence and went home to tell of his stories.
What do you remember about WWII in general?
Oh boy there was so many things (pause) rationing man there wasn't anything that wasn't rationed. Food rationed tire rationed. You couldn't buy sugar, you had to have coupons to buy anything. Even a pair of shoes and the shoes they didn't have leather and they didn't have rubber so shoes were practically made out of cardboard when you got them. I remember I saved up once to buy a pair of shoes I thought they were so pretty I kept looking at them and I was working Saturdays in school saved finally enough money to buy me a pair of sandals I never will forget it and the first time I had a date one Saturday night I wore those shoes and I thought I was the cutest thing you ever saw. And it started raining and those things almost flew off my feet but there practically made of cardboard and I was never so disgusted in my life. I know it was hard because you couldn't hardly by tires. Everybody would laugh and cut up it was funny because peoples attitude during the war everybody's tires were so bad and they would say well are you going to go and so a lot of people would say if I can find some more burlap to wrap around my tires. (Laugh) But you couldn't get tires and you couldn't get sugar and I remember my mother in the summer she'd make tea. Have you seen the little lemon drops that's got the sugar on them?(pause) she got to where she'd buy big sacks of those and when the tea was hot she dropped those in to the hot tea and that way you'd get some lemon and some sugar taste in the tea. So I thought that was pretty good thinking. There was just a whole lot of things that you couldn't live with. People just realized and they just made the best of it and nobody griped and complained. People had victory gardens were they could grow their own vegetables and grow their own food. We lived in a little town we had some chickens and a cow and my step dad always had a good size garden and people just learned to not to have to go to the store and buy everything other than just staple food.
How did you have to acclimate when your husband was off to war and you where home with your child having to be the "breadwinner" so to say?
Well, actually see Phil and I didn't marry until the war was over. He was discharged in '45. He came home from Europe in'45. I didn't meet him until I had come up to San Antonio to work and I was keeping books for a man, the head of the military department there at Joskies. It was what they called a leas department. He was under the name of Joskies but his space was Least, he owned his own business, but he paid his rent and proper per cent of what he made you know. So actually Phil and I didn't marry until after he was discharged we married in October of '47, a couple of years after the war was over.
Your jobs that you had during WWII, did they change after the war ended?
I went to business school in Laredo. I went to Business College there. I took a secretarial course and a bookkeeping course and when I got out of there this girlfriend of mine that I was close to their family, she was working in Alice Texas about 40 miles west of Corpus, so when I got out I went to Alice with her to get a job in Alice and I worked for a Whole Sale Grocer in Alice. That was my first job. That was in the later part of '45 or early '46. then she and I decided we would come to San Antonio to get a job and we came up here and that's when I went to work for Mr. Wisen in that military department. I kept books for him he had the military department there in Joske's and made tailor maid uniforms for the military. He also had a store up in Bandera, a western store; he also had a store in College Station so he sold uniforms and stuff like that to the cadets there at A and M. So I kept books for him.
What where you doing and were where you when it was announced that WWII had ended?
Yeah! I was going to school in Laredo. I was in business school in Laredo. During the war in Laredo we had the air force there and Laredo was just like everywhere else, I mean everybody was just beside themselves, they were so happy you know, when it was all over.
Where you able to go to school and get an education and did many other women get to go to school as you did?
Well, back in that time really about the only ones who were able to go to college back then were kid who's parents had an awful lot of money.
So you were out of the few that got an education?
Yes. I can contribute all that to my stepfather. I had one of the best stepfathers anyone could ever have. I just adored him. If my father had lived, he couldn't have been a better father than my step dad. When I was through school, he'd set me down and talked to me. He said now I want you to decide what you want to do. If you want to go to college, I'll see that you go, or if you don't want to go to college if you'd rather do something else you decide what you want to do. You can go to business school or beauty school, whatever you decide I want you to learn to make your own living and I don't want you to ever have to depend, marry and depend on a husband he said. I've seen so many women that married men that were alcoholics and abused them and they had to stay and put up with it because they couldn't get out and earn a living. They didn't know how. And he said I don't want you to ever get in that position. You learn to take care of yourself. That is one thing I will say. I was always good about listening to his advice. I did do that and got me an education. (You finished grade school, you graduated from high school, and then) I went to Business College. (And you graduated from there?) Yeah, I finished there.
How many years did it take you to do all of that?
Well, I don't know. I was in business school for over a year. I took a full year's course. I took the typing and the short hand and all of the secretarial stuff. Learned short hand and business English. I had to learn how to type letters and set them up and bookkeeping. I was just gonna take the secretarial course, but my step dad said no I think you should take both. Because even if you go to work as a secretary, there's usually some bookwork involved. And I'm so glad I listened to him because every job I ever had, it was more of the bookkeeping. I never did use secretarial stuff, not that much. Typing yes, but very little. The first job I had I used my shorthand some. But other than that it was mostly always books and bookkeeping. Back then kids just didn't get to go to college like they do now a days. People didn't have that kind of money. Times were so hard, they were doing good just to keep their kids clothed and fed and in high school, and a lot of kids didn't even finish high school. A lot of them would quit high school to help out the family. Get a job just to help out the family. Everybody was just trying to survive. It was just a different time it was just hard. I remember someone said to my mother one time, my brother was already in the service, and joined the navy in August in '41. And had just, he finished his boot camp and had come home on leave reported back to his base in California when Pearl Harbor was hit in December. And right away he was assigned to the old USS Lexington. This man he had a son who was going to college, and in a course of a conversation the man made the remark "Well, I think they ought to let the rich kids go ahead and finish their college and let the poor boys go do the fighting" And I'll tell you what, he almost had the fight of his life with my mother. I grantee you that. She tore him a new one. But a lot of it was true at that time just the rich kids were going to school and other kids got out of school they didn't even get to finish high school they had to help the family make ends meet. (Long pause)
Where there a lot of people who complained about hard times?
It was just my brother and I and of course when he went in the navy it was just me and a lot of kids I knew where from larger families. But everybody pretty much had the same rules I mean it was up to you. Everybody had chores to do at home and you were expected to do them, you know you helped out at home. But it was up to you to see that you did your homework. My mother never asked me do you have homework to do. That was my responsibility. You were brought up to realize your schoolwork was your responsibility. Your grades were your responsibility. It wasn't theirs. They were sending you to school. And it was your responsibility to do it. Most kids, they know that's how it had to be.
People just worked and kids went to school and did their chores and went to school. On Sunday you went to church and had a big Sunday dinner. (Laugh) It was a slower different time than it is now. A lot of people didn't event own an automobile. No family had 2 cars! That was unheard of. Most people, if you had one car, there was no television sets. The little town where I lived in, they had a little telephone office. We didn't have phones in our homes like they do now. It was a small town. If you needed to make a call you went to the telephone office. If you got a telegraph office at the rail road station. It was a quieter time and sometimes I think it was a better time. People didn't live on the go as fast as they do now. Kids walked to school. I walked home for lunch every day. It was just a lot quieter time. But there was rules. I knew that unless there was something at the school during the week, any time we was gonna do anything it had to be on Friday and Saturday night. Like now a days, kids go around in cars and stuff on weeknights. It wasn't that way back then. If kids wanted to get together, it would be a party at someone's house. We were lucky because my step dad, I would say my brother and I were lucky because he taught my brother to drive when he was young and let him have the car. And he also taught me how to drive and I was driving by the time I was 12, 13 years old. But it was a little town. There was no traffic like there is now.
Was it illegal? ( To drive at the age of 12 or 13)
They weren't as hard on people back then. Everybody knew you had a license but nobody thought anything about it. Some of the kids that did get cars, they didn't have licenses either. In fact I didn't get a license until after I married, and I drove lots of cars.
When you were younger did you ever feel that men were more powerful than women?
Yeah. I think it was a harder time for women to get into things and stand a fighting chance. Say law for instance. Women stood good chances especially in the nursing profession. That was always a good one if you could go to college and become a nurse. But even then they were limited. I think it would have been harder for them to become doctors way back then. You didn't see women ever in politics. I think the first I ever noticed women taking a political stand probably was Eleanor Roosevelt. She went into office in 1932 I'd a only been what 5 years old and he stayed in till '45. but you didn't see too many women in politics but you'd see her like I say when you'd go to movies you'd see new reels, and it would show her statements taking a stand on something, putting in a political opinion which was the first I'd ever seen of that. I local offices I can remember when we lived in Corpus, we lived across from a court down in town and that's where all the political rallies used to be for governor and all that stuff. They used to have those rallies right across the street from our house. It was always men. The women never did anything. It was just certain areas you know. We had cabs there when I was in Corpus when I was a kid, it was all men. You never saw a woman cab driver. Women had certain areas that they were allowed to be at. Teachers, that's always been a profession for women was nursing or teaching and secretarial or the phone company in retail stores. Doctors and dentist and professional people back then was always men. They were the dominant ones. The few that would insist on getting that would have had a tough fight trying to establish themselves probably.
If you had any advice to give women now, what would it be?
There is so many roads and opportunities that are open to girls now that heavens to betsy we wouldn't even thought about being able to do. I think it's great! Women's brains is good or better, I think than men, and the reason I say that is because I worked for years as an office administrator and all the men in that insurance, mostly all of them were men. Some of them were very inelegant men. I don't say they're not. But let me tell you what, I've seen some of the dumbest men I've ever seen in my life when I had to put up with them and explain things to them. It used to amaze me how dumb some of them was and I thought here we always thought they were smarter that we are. They're not! Some of the women that I know can out think them. A lot of the men. I think that in a lot of cases women are more honest. I've gone to some doctors and some professional people, I wouldn't go take my dog back to them. Just because they have a title doesn't mean that they're good at it. I think anything that a man can do, I think a woman with a brain, I know she can't, a woman could not physically compete with a man, it's just not possible. But mentally I think the world is open for women they have a path right now they can go any direction they want to go or do what they want to do if they just got the nerve and the drive to get in there and go for it. And I say go for it, whatever you decide you're gonna do. And if you have to force somebody along the way to get where you want to go, as long as it's legal I say do it. Because that's the way they operate. I still do everything for myself and I hope to for as long as I live. I wouldn't change the past, not too much. I led a good life and I like that I had 12 hears of alone time with Phil before we had Philip. We did a lot of traveling and had a great time before we had to settle down with any children we were going to have. Wait to have children and it is important for a husband and wife to communicate with one another. People don't do that enough now-a-days.
