Oral History Interview with Arnold Spivey

WILLIAM BERGE: The following is an unrehearsed tape interview with Mr. Arnold Spivey of Williamsburg, Kentucky. The interview is conducted by William Berge for the Kentucky Oral History Commission, at the Cumberland Falls State Park. The interview is conducted at Cumberland Falls State Park on September 29, 2000, at Ten AM. Mr. Spivey, I want to thank you for giving us this interview today, we really appreciate it. Start off by telling me your full name, and where you were born, and when you were born.

ARNOLD SPIVEY: Arnold Spivey, May the 20th, 1920, Muncy, Kentucky.

BERGE: Muncy?

SPIVEY: Yes. u-n-c-y .

BERGE: Where’s that?

SPIVEY: Jackson County.

BERGE: Whereabouts in Jackson County?

SPIVEY: About twelve miles southeast of McKee.

BERGE: Oh, ok. 1:00SPIVEY: It’s the county seat of Jackson County.

BERGE: I know where you are talking about.

SPIVEY: And I went in the three C’s age seventeen. My first job.

BERGE: Thirty-seven?

SPIVEY: 1937. October the tenth.

BERGE: Ok. Ok. What was your father’s name?

SPIVEY: Clay Spivey.

BERGE: Where was he born?

SPIVEY: He was born in Estill County.

BERGE: Estill County?

SPIVEY: Place called Wagersville.

BERGE: Oh, yeah I know where it is.

SPIVEY: A mile south of Irving.

BERGE: Yeah, I know where that is. What’s your mother—what’s her maiden name?

SPIVEY: My, mother’s name was Rhoda Strong Spivey. And she was born at Green Hall, Kentucky, on the Jackson, Owsley line.

BERGE: Ok. Ok. Toward Beattyville, I guess.

SPIVEY: No, it was more-so toward Boone.

BERGE: Oh, toward Boone, yes, ok. Ah, where—and you were born in Muncy?

SPIVEY: Yes.

BERGE: Where did you go to school?

SPIVEY: It was called New Zion School.

BERGE: Spell that.

SPIVEY: N e w Z 2:00i o n.

BERGE: Ok, New Zion.

SPIVEY: And school.

BERGE: Huh-huh. Where was that now?

SPIVEY: It was located at Muncy.

BERGE: At Muncy, ok. How many years did you go there?

SPIVEY: I went there through the eighth grade. Then I went in the three C’s.

BERGE: Huh-huh. Did you do any work at all before you went in the three C’s?

SPIVEY: Just around the farm.

BERGE: Just around the place there.

SPIVEY: Yeah, just around the place.

BERGE: Tell me this, do you remember why you went in the three C’s?

SPIVEY: I wanted to travel.

BERGE: Huh-huh. You did a lot of traveling?

SPIVEY: Yeah.

BERGE: And you wanted the money too I guess.

SPIVEY: Yes. That’s right too.

BERGE: Where did you join?

SPIVEY: I joined in McKee, Kentucky.

BERGE: At McKee?

SPIVEY: Yes.

BERGE: Do you remember whereabouts? What building?

SPIVEY: It was on Main Street, ( ) small towns. I know where it was located but that … BERGE: What was it the Post Office, or what?

SPIVEY: No, it was just an office 3:00building there.

BERGE: Just the three C’s?

SPIVEY: Yes..

BERGE: Ok.

SPIVEY: ( ) at McKee at the time and that is where we were examined. And sent to Fort Knox Kentucky.

BERGE: When you joined did you join with anyone else? Did you have any friends that went in with you?

SPIVEY: Yes.

BERGE: Do you remember who they were?

SPIVEY: I remember who they were. I went in with two brothers, ( ) Goble and his brother Pat Goble. They are both deceased now.

BERGE: Where did they go now?

SPIVEY: The same place I did, ( ) Idaho.

BERGE: Oh, you were with ( )? Huh-huh.

SPIVEY: Yes.

BERGE: Well, tell me this, when you joined, did they promise you, you would travel or did you think you might end up at McKee?

SPIVEY: I didn’t have no promise whatsoever.

BERGE: You didn’t.

SPIVEY: No.

BERGE: You just took a chance.

SPIVEY: I did.

BERGE: Huh-huh. So you joined, did your parents think it was a good idea?

SPIVEY: They didn’t object to it. 4:00BERGE: Hum-hum. And you joined and went to Fort Knox. How long did you stay at Fort Knox?

SPIVEY: Twenty-five days.

BERGE: And then where did you go?

SPIVEY: I went to Moscow, Idaho.

BERGE: Did you go home from Fort Knox before you left?

SPIVEY: No.

BERGE: You went to Fort Knox and then you went to Moscow, Idaho.

SPIVEY: Yes. It was about four days and four nights on the train.

BERGE: How long did you stay in Moscow?

SPIVEY: I was there six months.

BERGE: And then where did you go?

SPIVEY: I come back to Fort Knox, discharged and I come back home.

BERGE: Oh, so you just stayed in the six months.

SPIVEY: Six months.

BERGE: Ok. Now, what did you do at Fort Knox?

SPIVEY: Well, they had us ( ) wood, chopping down bushes, cutting briars … BERGE: Just general … SPIVEY: Just something to pass away the time.

BERGE: Was there anything going on out there particularly—were they cutting—they weren’t building anything 5:00were they?

SPIVEY: No. No.

BERGE: How many people were there? Do you remember?

SPIVEY: It was in the thousands. Up in the thousands.

BERGE: You mean in the CC’s?

SPIVEY: Back at Fort Knox?

BERGE: Oh, I meant Moscow.

SPIVEY: Well, I think there was about one hundred and twenty, something like that.

BERGE: And all you did was cut briars and stuff like that?

SPIVEY: That was at Fort Knox.

BERGE: Oh, at Fort Knox, I had that wrong. I am sorry. Well what did you do when you went to Moscow?

SPIVEY: It was a soil conservation camp. We dug ditches, sloped banks, cut wood, whatever they had to do.

BERGE: Where were most of the boys from that were there?

SPIVEY: Most of them were from Kentucky. Scattered and ( ) from Kentucky, just down toward Cincinnati, northern Kentucky.

BERGE: Yeah. But 6:00most of them were from Kentucky? Do you remember any other states they were from?

SPIVEY: Ohio, Tennessee, and some Ohio, but most was from Kentucky.

BERGE: When you got to Moscow, was there already a camp there?

SPIVEY: Yes.

BERGE: So you didn’t have to do any building of buildings or anything like that?

SPIVEY: No. Not whatsoever.

BERGE: What do you think of your experience did you like it?

SPIVEY: Yes, I did.

BERGE: What—a typical day—what did you do on a typical day there? Do you remember? Like what did you do—what time did you get up in the morning?

SPIVEY: I believe around seven o’ clock.

BERGE: Hum-hum. And then—did they ever have you do calisthenics in the morning?

SPIVEY: What’s that?

BERGE: Did you ever do any exercises in the morning, or did you just go and eat …?

SPIVEY: No, just washed up, and went to eat, then after we come back we made up our bunks; and then went to our job in trucks, sometimes 7:00it would be ten or twelve miles, or sometimes it would be forty or fifty miles.

BERGE: Oh, really? And then you would get to come back in the evening, I guess.

SPIVEY: Yes, in the afternoon. Wash up and … BERGE: Eat again?

SPIVEY: Yes. And that was all till nine o’ clock, and at nine o’ clock we’d go to bed.

BERGE: What would you do between the time you ate and nine o ‘ clock, do you remember? Anything?

SPIVEY: I don’t understand … BERGE: Well what did they have any kind of activities for you in the evening? After dinner like—after you ate supper, did you ever go into town or … SPIVEY: Yeah, we’d go to town. It was three-fourths of a mile to town from where our camp was at.

BERGE: How far?

SPIVEY: Three quarters of a mile.

BERGE: Oh, you could walk in there.

SPIVEY: Yeah, we could walk in town, yeah.

BERGE: Were the people nice to you?

SPIVEY: Yeah, it was a college town. We didn’t get along too good with the college boys. 8:00We called them sheep-herders, and they didn’t like that.

BERGE: (laughing) What would you do when you went to town?

SPIVEY: Go to the show.

BERGE: Go to the movies.

SPIVEY: Yeah.

BERGE: How much did it cost you? Do you remember?

SPIVEY: I do. About twenty-five or thirty cents, something like that.

BERGE: That was quite a bit when you were just making five dollars for yourself. Do you remember—did you think the food was very good?

SPIVEY: Yes, it was. Yes. No complaints.

BERGE: Hum-hum. Why did you not reenlist, or whatever, why did you get out in six months?

SPIVEY: Well, I was seventeen years old and never been away from home before … BERGE: You were ready to go home.

SPIVEY: I wanted to go back home, but I wasn’t out a week, and I wished I had of stayed. 9:00BERGE: Oh, is that right?

SPIVEY: I got ( ).

BERGE: And you couldn’t go back in or anything I guess?

SPIVEY: You had to stay out six months before you could reenlist.

BERGE: Oh, I didn’t know that.

SPIVEY: They had that rule.

BERGE: So what did you do after you came back home?

SPIVEY: I stayed around a while and helped on the farm and then I went to Cincinnati and got a job in a factory.

BERGE: What year was that do you remember?

SPIVEY: March, 1941.

BERGE: What was the date when you went in the service—when you went in the CC’s?

SPIVEY: October the Tenth 1937.

BERGE: Thirty-seven. When you went up there in March of forty-one, where did you work in Cincinnati?

SPIVEY: It was a place called K. D. Lamp Company. Made automobile lights.

BERGE: How long did you stay there? 10:00SPIVEY: A year and one-half.

BERGE: Then what did you do?

SPIVEY: I went to a machine shop. Got the same amount of money but ( ).

BERGE: And how long did you stay there?

SPIVEY: I believe about a year, or something like that.

BERGE: And then what did you do? Remember?

SPIVEY: I went to another factory but I can’t remember which one it was.

BERGE: But in and around Cincinnati?

SPIVEY: Yes. Around Cincinnati.

BERGE: How long did you stay there, in that country?

SPIVEY: I was in and out for twenty-three years.

BERGE: In and out of Cincinnati?

SPIVEY: In and out of Cincinnati for twenty-three years.

BERGE: Spent the rest of the time coming down, twenty-five and twenty-seven, to go home I guess.

SPIVEY: Yes. Right. I always wanted to come back to Kentucky, and at last I finally got a job in Richmond Kentucky.

BERGE: Where did you work in Richmond Kentucky?

SPIVEY: It was called 11:00Robinson Tool and Dye.

BERGE: Oh, yeah, I know where it is.

SPIVEY: They sold out there to ( ).

BERGE: Yeah.

SPIVEY: And I worked there for a little over twenty years. And retired at age sixty-five.

BERGE: Yeah. Yeah, I know where Robinson Tool and Dye is; I taught at Eastern for forty-three years.

SPIVEY: Yeah? ( ) my wife is from Williamsburg, and after I retired we come to Williamsburg, and next month it will be about fifteen years.

BERGE: Hum-hum. You used to live in Rich—where did you live in Richmond?

SPIVEY: I lived at 620 West Old Street.

BERGE: Oh, yeah, I know where that is.

SPIVEY: On the corner of ( ).

BERGE: Yeah, I know exactly where your house was.

SPIVEY: ( ) a man by the name of Norman Bogey.

BERGE: Oh, yeah, I know him.

SPIVEY: He is well known in Richmond.

BERGE: Yeah. I lived on Arlington Drive, which is sort of across from Arlington there, 12:00from the next street over.

SPIVEY: Is it near the Gateway Grocery?

BERGE: Yeah, behind Gateway is where I lived. Yeah. Well tell me about your ( ), if a stranger came in here, and I am a stranger, and found out that you were in the three C’s, and I asked you, “well, just what were the three C’s, and what was your impression of it, how important was it to your life, to have been in there?” SPIVEY: Well, I was glad I went, but the experience from it, being in there.

BERGE: What was the best part of that experience? Getting along with other people or what?

SPIVEY: Well, that was one of them. Yes.

BERGE: If you had it to do all over again would you do it?

SPIVEY: Yes, I would.

BERGE: Well, I think 13:00it was a wonderful thing when it came around, I guess after—every month they gave you five dollars, is that right?

SPIVEY: Yes. Sent twenty-five home.

BERGE: Sent twenty-five home. I guess your folks were glad to get that twenty-five, weren’t they?

SPIVEY: Yes.

BERGE: (laughs) Those were hard times.

SPIVEY: They were ( ).

BERGE: They really were.

SPIVEY: Went a long ways back in them days.

BERGE: Yeah. Twenty-five dollars was a good money for a lot of people, that didn’t have twenty-five dollars a month.

SPIVEY: Right.

BERGE: Did you ever work in the wild woods?

SPIVEY: Very little.

BERGE: Very little.

SPIVEY: A little bit, not too much.

BERGE: Huh-huh. What kind of work did you do around the farm?

SPIVEY: We raised corn, taters, hogs. 14:00BERGE: Do you still ever—do you still ever keep in contact with any of the people you were stationed with in Moscow?

SPIVEY: No. When I first started coming here in eighty-nine, there were four other men come here from my camp, as far as Iowa City, some of them; but some of them has passed away.

BERGE: Huh-huh.

SPIVEY: Some, I don’t know what ever happened to them, because they haven’t been here in five or six years.

BERGE: Do you and your wife have any children?

SPIVEY: No.

BERGE: Ok. She had family in Williamsburg, does she?

SPIVEY: That’s right. She was brought up here, her father was a coal miner.

BERGE: Oh. Oh. That’s a good job not to have. (laughs) Do you have any questions you would like to ask?

UNIDENTIFIED VOICE ONE: I can’t think of anything off hand.

UNIDENTIFIED VOICE TWO: I--the main reason you left 15:00was homesickness, I guess?

SPIVEY: Well, that was part of it yes. ( ) ( ). I never left home in my life till the three C’s.

BERGE: You said they had a camp in McKee?

SPIVEY: Yes, I did.

BERGE: Where was it there? Do you remember?

SPIVEY: It was about, well it was more than a half a mile south of McKee, going out 421.

BERGE: What did those boys do, do you remember?

SPIVEY: It was a forest service.

BERGE: Huh-huh. Did you know any of those guys when you were younger?

SPIVEY: Yes, I did.

BERGE: Was that one of the things that got you to join do you think?

SPIVEY: Well, what most of all got me to join, because being in the three C’s coming back and telling stories … BERGE: Where they had been and … SPIVEY: Where they’d been and what they had seen.

BERGE: Can you remember any of the particulars where any of your friends had been, and what they had seen, and what they had thought of it?

SPIVEY: Well, 16:00I had one friend that was in Glacier National Park in Montana.

BERGE: Oh, he liked that I bet.

SPIVEY: Yes, he did.

BERGE: Huh-huh.

SPIVEY: And I had another friend that was in California.

BERGE: Yeah. Well there were quite a few people from around McKee who had been in the three C’s?

SPIVEY: Most of them. At that age … BERGE: It was a good place for them.

SPIVEY: ( ) twenty-six or ( ) … BERGE: Yeah. Yeah.

SPIVEY: They ( ).

BERGE: So you were eighteen when you went in?

SPIVEY: No they finally came down to seventeen. I was seventeen when I went in.

BERGE: You went in when you were seventeen.

SPIVEY: I wish I’d stayed two years. But unless you had an important job like a cook or something … BERGE: And you wish that you had stayed longer now?

SPIVEY: Yes.

BERGE: If you had stayed would you have stayed in the same place? I mean if you had reenlisted probably 17:00… SPIVEY: That’s where they had kept me, yeah.

BERGE: Probably if it had been a different kind of place you would have … SPIVEY: At that time you could stay a year in the west, and they would ship you back east, you didn’t know where you were going to be. I know several people that stayed there a year, and would come back, and went to ( ) Kentucky, about fifteen miles from—south of Cincinnati, some went to Pineville, Kentucky, some went to Bell Farm in McCreary county. That’s the place that … BERGE: Yeah. Yeah. What did those fellas that were stationed over there on the ( ); what did they do in the woods, do you have any idea?

SPIVEY: Oh, ( ) trees they worked and built roads and bridges. 18:00BERGE: Do you know of any of them that are still there that they built?

SPIVEY: Yes. There is one at Turkey Foot.

BERGE: Oh, yes, I know where it is. And they built that bridge?

SPIVEY: Yes.

BERGE: You know where Horse ( ) is?

SPIVEY: Yes. Sure do.

BERGE: You been down in that country? I used to fish with those red eyes down there.

SPIVEY: Horse Lick, Indian Creek country.

BERGE: Yeah. Yeah.

SPIVEY: ( ), BERGE: What is that called? They worked up in there too, I guess.

SPIVEY: Yes. For the forest service.

BERGE: Yeah. Do you know anything about that country over there in Estill county, which—I can’t remember the name of it—Happy Top Mountain--do you know where that is?

SPIVEY: I’ve heard of it but I’ve never been there.

BERGE: You 19:00go over the back way—like up to that forest tower … SPIVEY: Like ( ) BERGE: Yeah, it is just above Pigeon Camp Creek, Happy Top Mountain is. Yeah.

What kind of a—when you were a kid around McKee—I am sort of interested in McKee, I’ve not talked to a lot of people from over there. What did you do for entertainment? What was there to do?

SPIVEY: There wasn’t anything to do for entertainment. I guess the most entertainment I got was on a coon hunt.

BERGE: I was going to ask you if you liked being in the woods.

SPIVEY: Yes, I like in the woods, yes. I like the ( ) rabbit hunting.

BERGE: You do like squirrel hunting, and coon hunting, yeah; do you have a dog?

SPIVEY: Yes.

BERGE: Got some good ones do you?

SPIVEY: I ( ).

BERGE: Yeah. Yeah. Good 20:00dogs are hard to get aren’t they?

SPIVEY: Back in them days they were mountain curs—had to be a rich man to have a hound.

BERGE: Yeah. Yeah..

SPIVEY: A mountain cur was good for everything and anything.

BERGE: Or nothing. (laughter) How far out of McKee did you live?

SPIVEY: About twelve miles.

BERGE: Twelve miles, huh-huh.

SPIVEY: We was right on the Jackson County ( ) Owsley, we didn’t have to ( ) four counties.

BERGE: Yeah. Yeah. How far did you live from the river?

SPIVEY: The river? I’d say at least twelve miles.

BERGE: Twelve miles.

SPIVEY: To ( ).

BERGE: Idleburg.

SPIVEY: Idleburg, yes. 21:00BERGE: Well, I sure do want to thank you for coming in here and telling us about your experience, and how important it was for you to be in the three C’s. Do you think that when you were out looking for a job, that the fact that you were in there helped you get a job?

SPIVEY: I would say it did, yes.

BERGE: People liked three C’s people didn’t they?

SPIVEY: Yes.

BERGE: People liked the way they worked and everything. Did, by and large, was it a friendly bunch you were with?

SPIVEY: Yes they were.

BERGE: And you liked the people you were with out there?

SPIVEY: I guess at least twenty young men from Jackson County ( ) went in, and I got acquainted with them later; and they are about all passed away now. Not too many got well.

BERGE: Well that was something to be way out there with all those people from home wasn’t it?

SPIVEY: Yes, it was.

BERGE: Do you think they did that purposely? 22:00So you guys wouldn’t be homesick and stuff?

SPIVEY: I really don’t know.

BERGE: There might very well have been a reason for it. Cause they sure shipped them together as much as they could.

SPVEY: They separated them quite a bit, but most of the time they did.

BERGE: Well, I sure want to thank you Mr. Spivey for coming by here and telling us about your experiences.

SPIVEY: You are welcome, END OF SIDE ONE TAPE ONE SPIVEY END OF INTERVIEW.