Oral History Interview with Gabe Blunk

BERGE: The following is an unrehearsed interview with Mr. Gabe Blunk, of Louisville Kentucky. The interview is conducted at Cumberland Falls State Park, on February 16, 1990, about eleven-thirty AM. The interview is conducted by William Berge for the State Oral History Commission. Mr. Blunk, I want to thank you for coming down here, all the way down here to talk with us this week end. I don’t really have too much to talk with you about now, but I will this afternoon when all four of us—or all four of you get together, but there is a couple of things that I wanted to ask you about that I didn’t ask you about the first time we talked. Do you remember any educational programs down here? When you were here?

BLUNK: Not really. 1:00BERGE: Yeah, some people remember them and some people don’t. So you probably didn’t have any of them… BLUNK: I wasn’t involved in them so I… BERGE: There was a, Mr., ah—there were a couple of the Army officers ran them and had some kind of classes. Then there was a Mr. Weins that… BLUNK: I just remember his name… BERGE: Oh, you do remember his name? You remember that Jack? Do you remember him? All right, did you ever go on any of those forest fires?

BLUNK: Yes, yes.

BERGE: Which ones?

BLUNK: I have no idea, we just got called out… BERGE: You went out on more than one, did you?

BLUNK: Yeah. At night time, generally and cart us off to a spot and there was the fire and a rake or two or something to work (with). It was all underbrush, it wasn’t in the top of the trees, and just a matter of breaking the—making a brake in the leaves or the brush so that the fire could burn itself out. 2:00And it wouldn’t keep on progressing over the ground.

BERGE: Did you remember when you went on those fires, did they have somebody who knew something about them, that was in charge of the crew?

BLUNK: They didn’t. We didn’t know anything about it. (laughs) BERGE: Were you one of the ones?

BLUNK: In charge of it? I was the leader, but we were all together and we just… BERGE: Did the best you could, huh?

BLUNK: We just saw what needed to be done and did it.

BERGE: Yeah, yeah. So you really weren’t trained for any of this kind of… BLUNK: No, no we were… UNIDENTIFIED VOICE ONE: Yes, we were.

BERGE: In what way?

UNIDENTIFIED VOICE ONE: We were trained to backfire and… BERGE: Well, where was that, at the camp?

UNIDENTIFIED VOICE ONE: We carried fifty—uh, buckets or whatever you call them ( ) BLUNK: No, I didn’t, I wasn’t involved in any of that.

BERGE: Well, you know probably they had a different kinds—they had different kinds of things. I know somebody 3:00this morning, it may have been Houston, he said, that, you know, they could have had training, but when he thought about it he said, “you know really it was all done so fast, they were just trying to get the thing organized and get people down to these places”. Yeah, you stayed longer than six months, you told me… BLUNK: Yeah, I was fifteen months.

BERGE: Yeah. Did you—how long did it take you all to get barracks built after you moved in here?

BLUNK: We came in, in May and barracks was—well the mess hall was the first thing that went up and that was sometime late in the summer, maybe early in the summer—but the barracks themselves didn’t start until September, or the first of October.

BERGE: Huh-huh. So really the first six months, really, as Jack said, were probably set up—were really spent setting the camp up 4:00as much as anything else, weren’t they? A lot of the work was.

BLUNK: Um, well setting up tents didn’t involve a whole lot of time. After we got the tents up and they really had to go up the first night we landed here. If we were going to have any place to sleep. And they gave us cots and blankets and there you are.

BERGE: And then they immediately began working on the trails and stuff after that?

BLUNK: Pretty close after that. We had to ditch the tents to keep any… BERGE: So all the time you were working on the camp, you were also working on the park.

BLUNK: Yeah. Hum-hum.

BERGE: Did you ever go to that Moonbow Inn when you were here?

BLUNK: Yes.

BERGE: You did?

BLUNK: Yeah.

BERGE: Do you have any idea how the people who owned that felt about the State Park?

BLUNK: No, I have no idea.

BERGE: No, you would have no way to know that.

BLUNK: I do know, that the CCC put in a septic tank for the hotel.

BERGE: Do you remember when that—was that the first summer?

BLUNK: Yeah. 5:00yeah. I really don’t know what part of the year it was.

BERGE: That year or so you were around here do you ever remember, seeing any WPA workers?

BLUNK: No, except one young fellow who was an artist, was sent to the camp to sketch our activities. I assume that he was with the WPA. He was—it was a government assignment and he was here for a couple of weeks.

BERGE: Yeah. Orvill Carroll.

BERGE: He might—I think Steve could probably run this down, somewhere—Washington—‘cause if he was here they got art work somewhere.

UNIDENTIFIED VOICE TWO: Yeah.

BLUNK: Well, now I saw his sketches.

BERGE: Oh, you did?

BLUNK: Yeah. They were just notebook sketches.

BERGE: Yeah.

BLUNK: And, ah, and I presume he took them with him, back to Louisville, to… BERGE: Well, ( ) should have some record of them somewhere, probably.

BLUNK: If he is still alive, 6:00he lives in New Albany, Indiana, and he… BERGE: And I could find out from him, maybe, about…what was his first name?

BLUNK: Orville.

BERGE: That’s right. You told me that before. But you never did see any WPA workers building, oh, bridges or anything of that nature. All the building around here was CCC building.

BLUNK: Yes.

BERGE: I asked this of Jack a little while ago, and maybe you can remember. Like when you fellas would build these trails and you would bring these rocks to make steps and that sort of thing… BLUNK: Yeah.

BERGE: Jack recalls that the rocks came from the river.

BLUNK: It was local; now where it came from—whatever was convenient.

BERGE: There was no mortar or anything on those steps.

BLUNK: That’s right BERGE: How did the skills—how did they find out who had the skills for this kind of work?

BLUNK: (laughs) I think it was cut and try. ( snickers in the background) And some fellows that showed a little ingenuity or expertise. 7:00He was… BERGE: He was the one that did it.

BLUNK: Well, no, or at least he showed other fellas how to do it and they all learned from him. It was on the job training.

BERGE: It was amazing how well that worked. Now they would spend years to train people to go out and do what those guys did the first day. That is the amazing thing about it. Do you remember any moonshine stills around?

BLUNK: Well I know there was moonshine, I never knew where the stills were. (laughs) A lot of it showed up in camp, one way or another.

BERGE: Which one of you two stole Okey’s home brew out of the spring?

(laughter). He said he brought some home brew back of Louisville and he hid it in the spring and went back it was gone.

UNIDENTIFIED VOICE TWO: I’m going to take a couple more folks down to the falls. Is 8:00that all right with you?

BERGE: Well, Jack wants to go.

UNIDENTIFIED VOICE TWO: Ok. Are you still interviewing… BERGE: No. No, but let’s pick us a time for lunch. It is twenty-five of twelve, what would be—how soon will you be back?

UNIDENTIFIED VOICE TWO: Probably take about forty minutes.

BERGE: Ok. Let’s decide to eat when you come back and then you can ( ) with your slides.

UNIDENTIFIED VOICE TWO: Ok.

BERGE: And… SEVERAL VOICES: Well, I’ve only got room for about three or four.

He just went down.

I just went down.

We didn’t go to the falls. We went down… BERGE: No, but I think that if you and Jack and those other people up there, can go like Herald and those people can go down now, then when we come back we can eat lunch and we can all come in here and the four men can sit over here. You and I can sit here and you can show those pictures and if you want their wives can come in too.

UNIDENTIFIED VOICE TWO: I’ll probably need about a half hour to put the slides in.

BERGE: Sure, well we’ll get it figured out by one-thirty or something like that. 9:00So I will see you all about twelve-fifteen or twelve-thirty in the other room.

UNIDENTIFIED VOICE TWO: Sounds good.

BERGE: Is that all right?

UNIDENTIFIED VOICE TWO: Yeah. Can you tell them I will be out there in a minute? I am going to try to ( ) and I might be able to get another person in the…I came without--I didn’t have my keys to the truck. And I went to get the Van and the battery was dead in the Van, so I am driving around in one of the maintenance trucks—class two vehicle here.

BERGE: You know I was talking about these things—you were telling me—I was trying to remember what you were telling me before, but I mean you told me about how you sort of got into, you know, into the beginning your first big job was to build the water tower.

BLUNK: Right.

BERGE: How many fellows worked with you on that? Do you remember?

BLUNK: I guess about eight or ten, 10:00something like that. They—that’s on the site it was a huge group of them that went out into the woods and cut the logs—the main logs for the thing and drug them in; and it was probably twenty-five men that were dragging those… BERGE: You know even though you—all you fellows did all this work; who was the one who decided what was to be done and… BLUNK: I think that started with the Captain.

BERGE: Huh-huh.

BLUNK: Now there were a number of Rangers assigned to the group and what coordination there was between the Captain and the Rangers, I never was… BERGE: Do you remember the Captain’s name?

BLUNK: Well, Bucher was the one that was first here. Bowman was the one that signed my discharge.

BERGE: Ok. But when you first came it was… BLUNK: Captain Bucher and he was from Fort Thomas Kentucky.

BERGE: Ok. Remember where Bowman was from?

BLUNK: No.

BERGE: The 11:00first group of you who came in May of thirty-three, now that was really the first CCC--you came with the first ones who showed up here.

BLUNK: Yeah. Hum-hum.

BERGE: Were about all of you from Louisville in that very first group?

BLUNK: Yes.

BERGE: It was like a Louisville group that came here.

BLUNK: Well, we were all signed up at the same office down town, so it was—it had to be… BERGE: Do you think that being in the woods like this was a kind of culture shock for some of those kids from Louisville?

BLUNK: Could be.

BERGE: You don’t remember them talking about it, or anything like that.

BLUNK: No, they just took it in their stride and went on about it. Personally, it was something I really looked forward to, because, not only when this thing came up, I had already been in contact with some people 12:00trying to get a job out in the forest.

BERGE: So this was right up your alley, sort of… BLUNK: Well, it was one of my interests; what I was training for.

BERGE: Yeah, but I mean it was something you were really interested in from day one.

BLUNK: Yeah. Huh-huh.

BERGE: The—did you ever have any reason to be down around the State Lodge, when you were here? What did the State have here in this park? I mean there was a park here when you all were working and visitors came—what did they come to do?

BLUNK: To see the falls and that was it.

BERGE: Was there any place for them to stay?

BLUNK: No.

BERGE: Except like Moonbow Inn or something like that.

BLUNK: Yeah. If they wanted to… BERGE: Did they all come from this side of the river or did they ever come in from the other side of the river and come over?

BLUNK: Well I wouldn’t have any way of knowing if they—they had equal access from both sides.

BERGE: Hum-hum. Gabe do you remember a basket across the river? 13:00BLUNK: A mail basket.

BERGE: But you don’t remember a basket that people could ride in?

BLUNK: No. There may have been, but that would be in high water. In normal levels people could walk across.

BERGE: Huh-huh. And how high would it be then?

BLUNK: Up to you knees.

BERGE: Did they drive vehicles through there and everything?

BLUNK: Yeah, we drove trucks to get over to the Sterns location.

BERGE: Did you ever go to any of these things that people call side camps?

BLUNK: Yeah, Sterns was ( ) a side, no it was, Stern was really establishing a new camp for a company that was coming in. And we were there during the construction period to kind of keep watch and—but we were there for maybe a month. They… BERGE: Kind of guard.

BLUNK: Now the side camps, normally that was for a new company 14:00or—they never sent a contingent from our company.

BERGE: At least the ones you knew of.

BLUNK: Yeah.

BERGE: Now, uhm, earlier today when I was talking with Okey, he remembered going to two different side camps. This would ( ) at the time, said that there would only be a couple of people, like there was one down near Barbourville a little place called ( )… BLUNK: Yeah.

BERGE: And there was another one—oh, I don’t remember where the other one near ( ) I guess… BLUNK: Yeah, in the mountains.

BERGE: Yeah. I don’t remember; but he said you would just go for a couple days, you know , that there were just a few of them like four or five.

BLUNK: Yeah, I really think that what we had a Sterns was what he was calling a side camp.

BERGE: Ok. Ok.

BLUNK: It was a side camp in that we sent a contingent from… BERGE: Oh, I see what you are talking about… BLUNK: ( ) but rather just be there and… BERGE: When something was being done.

BLUNK: Yeah. So that it wasn’t… BERGE: Do you remember ever going into town, into Corbin? 15:00BLUNK: Oh, yeah. Every chance I had.

BERGE: How did you get in?

BLUNK: Truck. They—and anybody that was ready to go, just climb on. They’d make several trips into town and then later—late that evening, probably about eleven o’ clock , why the truck would start or THE truck would start running back.

BERGE: This is probably on the weekends you are talking about.

BLUNK: Yeah. Saturday and… BERGE: Did you—what did you spend your money for, and where did you spend it?

BLUNK: Well, spend a lot on films and… BERGE: Did they ( ) at the camp?

BLUNK: I really don’t remember where it was we got it, but there was a photographic studio in Corbin a couple of them there that processed the film for us.

BERGE: You probably bought it there too.

BLUNK: I guess I did.

BERGE: Do you remember anything like a PX at the camp?

BLUNK: Oh, yeah, they 16:00had cigarettes and candy, and in fact I worked in it for a couple of weeks.

BERGE: Oh, really?

BLUNK: Yeah.

BERGE: Was that additional work to the regular work,. or was that part of your work?

BLUNK: Yeah… BERGE: Do you remember?

BLUNK: (silence) BERGE: Did they pay you extra for that?

BLUNK: Oh, no, no extra pay---I’m trying to remember whether I worked in the daytime—and opened that thing at night, I think they let me off the daytime work.

BERGE: When you were doing that.

BLUNK: Yeah.

BERGE: That was probably--you didn’t do that too long.

BLUNK: No.

BERGE: Do you remember any fires near the camp here.

BLUNK: Not near. No.

BERGE: He actually is trying to find out, sometime if anybody remembers a garage running in the camp. Do you remember that?

BLUNK: No. No.

BERGE: That might have been a different time. You know that really could have been a different time. Do 17:00you ever remember any work that they had the boys, the men doing that you might consider to be dangerous work?

BLUNK: The nearest thing to that would be dynamiting some of the rock down at the parking lot. There was a fella who did have some experience with that and they were very cautious and they always yelled out a signal when they were going to fire the thing.

BERGE: Do you remember who that was?

BLUNK: Yeah, Frankie Newman.

BERGE: Where was he from?

BLUNK: Louisville.

BERGE: That—Mr. Fuller had—he must have had some experience with explosives too, didn’t he?

BLUNK: Yes. But whether he had it before he came to the CCC or not, I have no way of knowing.

BERGE: Now, when Mr. Fuller came here, the camp was already established here wasn’t it?

BLUNK: Yeah, he came I think, like in September. We were already a going concern.

BERGE: That is when people from other places, besides Louisville 18:00started coming in wasn’t it?

BLUNK: Yeah. Huh-huh.

BERGE: He, ah, he describes himself as a real loner.

BLUNK: I would say so.

BERGE: Would you say that about him?

BLUNK: Yeah, uh-huh. He and I got along very well.

BERGE: Yeah, he said he knew you and you were one of the few people that he was—he said he wasn’t very close to any people and you were one of the people that he was. But he just described himself as a loner.

BLUNK: Yeah. Hun-hum.

BERGE: I think it probably had something to do with his background and… BLUNK: Uh-huh.

BERGE: He probably in awe of some of these city boys that was here and vice versa, that type of thing.

BLUNK: There was some interesting fellas in the group; a number of them came in when Houston came in. They were local and they were strictly mountain people… BERGE: Yeah, Jack said—the way he described them was, “then we got local talent.” BLUNK: Huh-huh. They were good fellas… BERGE: Yeah that is what he said.

BLUNK: …and one fella, 19:00for some reason, he took a liking to me and one week end he invited me to go home with him spend a… BERGE: When was that, do you remember?

BLUNK: I don’t know—you mean when?

BERGE: Where was that… BLUNK: Oh, in Pineville.

BERGE: Pineville.

BLUNK: Huh-huh. And they lived in rather poor circumstances. They had one bedroom and they put me and the other fella in that bedroom and the family slept elsewhere; and they didn’t have but about three rooms in the whole house.

BERGE: What was his name?

BLUNK: I really don’t know.

BERGE: That was a good experience for you too wasn’t it?

BLUNK: Oh, yeah.

BERGE: There were probably a lot of experiences here that were like that, that were very important to a persons life and you wouldn’t have been realizing it when you were here.

BLUNK: Oh, yeah.

BERGE: Did–did you—was there a hierarchy of jobs that—were some jobs considered good jobs and some jobs were considered bad jobs in the camp?

BLUNK: Oh, it really depends 20:00upon the individual who was talking about it. I guess you call the company clerks job something that was—would be nice to have. It was an office job… BERGE: Somebody else might not like that job.

BLUNK: That’s right. And ( ) the fella that got it knew what he was doing, he could do it, and he was efficient at it and… BERGE: Yeah.

BLUNK: …um BERGE: Did they have any jobs like chauffeurs or did somebody drive… BLUNK: Well, truck drivers, yeah.

BERGE: How about Mr. Wentworth, did they drive him around?

BLUNK: No. He had his own car and he traveled—whether he stayed here in the Rangers shack, I don’t know, but his home was in Corbin.

BERGE: Where did the officers live?

BLUNK: There was a separate building. Kind of separated over a ravine.

BERGE: I guess in the beginning they probably lived in camp too?

BLUNK: Yeah, I think there was on tent… BERGE: An officer’s tent? 21:00BLUNK: Yeah.

BERGE: Did you have—I know this is kind of hard because I an going to ask you all again, but I would just like to hear what you have to say while you are here alone. How important do you think your CCC experience had been to you in your life?

BLUNK: Well it certainly was an enjoyable experience and I would think that it had quite a bit of importance; not that I learned any particular trade or any ability, but I think making decisions for myself and working out problems as we went.

BERGE: Probably was important to you.

BLUNK: Yeah: BERGE: This afternoon when we are talking about these things, I am going to ask questions that you all can react to and then you can react to each other; you know, 22:00to see to what extent you agree or disagree on the impact of stuff. Another thing I might do, if you all don’t mind, I have a list of names of people who are based in the Louisville area… BLUNK: Yeah.

BERGE: And I might ask you all if you recollect any of them, or know of any of them, if you would. Then that would be helpful for me if I call them and talk to them, I can say, well I know so and so and he told me that he knows you and that…. Uh, when you all moved into the barracks finally—like when you got there in tents, how many stayed in the tents?

BLUNK: Everybody.

BERGE: No. I mean how many to each tent?

BLUNK: Oh, about twenty-five… BERGE: Oh, they were really massive then.

BLUNK: Yeah, they were.

BERGE: Did they assign you or did you all sort of pick off and I’ll stay here… BLUNK: No, you were in what they called subsections and there was one subsection to a tent.

BERGE: Was it the same way when you moved into the barracks then?

BLUNK: Yes.

BERGE: Ok. So it was just like the army in that sense. 23:00People didn’t run around trying to find a place to live. They knew where everybody was… BLUNK: Yeah.

BERGE: Did they take roll every day?

BLUNK: Yes.

BERGE: Just like… BLUNK: Roll call each morning.

BERGE: Ok. so they always knew who was there. How about medical care?

BLUNK: There was a doctor that came in, I would guess about once a week, and if necessary he came oftener. I understood that he had several companies that he visited.

BERGE: Oh, ok. There wasn’t a civilian doctor, but he was a… BLUNK: No he was a medic, he was an army doctor.

BERGE: Yeah, but he just worked with you in the tents?

BLUNK: Yes. And they had a room in the administration building that was called the hospital and that was where anybody—that’s where you went if you needed help or if you were sick, that is where they put you.

BERGE: These officers you all had, do you think they were regular army officers, or were they reserves? 24:00BLUNK: I think Captain Buchner was a regular army officer. I know that Lieutenant Dundon was a reserve.

BERGE: How about the—did you have any sergeants?

BLUNK: Yes, the mess sergeant.

BERGE: Ok. But that is the only sergeant you remember. They didn’t have drill sergeants or anything like that?

BLUNK: No.

BERGE: Did the Lieutenant and the Captain, were they really vitally interested in what you were doing? Did they go around and watch or did they just sort of fool around?

BLUNK: No, they did not enter into our actual work. The Rangers were—they looked after that. They were more concerned with the camp functioning as… BERGE: And discipline… BLUNK: Yeah, and discipline and how—what their division was between the Officers and the Rangers was, as far as authority was concerned, I wouldn’t know.

BERGE: Did the guests at the park 25:00ever talk to you?

BLUNK: No.

BERGE: You don’t remember talking to them?

BLUNK: No.

BERGE: Did people, when you would go home, or people you would meet in Corbin, or wherever, did people who had nothing to do with the CCC, did they seem to be interested in them? Did they ask you questions about it?

BLUNK: No, we were just people. We were just ordinary… BERGE: So it wasn’t something that people were vitally interested in or anything like that.

BLUNK: Not people we did—no.

BERGE: Well, I just wondered how people reacted to you. You said, or somebody said, that they didn’t seem to really have any trouble with local people like they sometime do at military bases. That they were generally accepted BLUNK: Oh, we were accepted, you know, whether well or not.

BERGE: Well I know the local boys would have been happy, the local girls be interested maybe… 26:00BLUNK: I got a reaction some years later when probably about twenty-five years later, my wife and daughters came down to Cumberland Falls for a summer vacation. We stopped at a stall somewhere just outside of Corbin and they had something my wife was interested in and the fellows presented and I brought up the subject of the CCC at Cumberland Falls. He looked at me so disgustedly, “you were one of them.” BERGE: Probably had something to do with his sister or something. (laughs) BLUNK: Yeah.

BERGE: Well, I want to thank you Mr. Blunk, and this afternoon, I am really looking forward to it when we all talk about the stuff together here. Thank you.

END OF TAPE