Oral History Interview with Robert Wilson Young

CASSIE MULLINS: So now it's on, and just state your name and where you live.

ROBERT W. YOUNG: R.W. Young, well, I live at Hindman. My mail is Hindman, box 494.

C.M.: Okay, and how old are you, Mr. Young?

YOUNG: I'm seventy-nine.

C.M.: All right, what years were you at the Hindman Settlement School? Did you go to school there?

YOUNG: Well, I went, that's about the only place I ever did go to school. 1:00I started it, let's see. I was six years old when I started. They didn't have much kindergarten then, I don't know about the dates of that. Maybe just a very little. I went through twelve grades. Well, that's about all. I just remember a little bit down in the first, second and third grades. Our teacher was Miss Treadway and Miss Manzart, 2:00I believe was their names. And then when it got up to the fifth grade, Faith Hill was the teacher. And in the sixth, Miss West, I don't know what her first name was. Let's see, what was the sixth grade. In the seventh and eighth, I had Mr. Potter and Bevie Pratt. She was Bevie Perkins at that time. And they taught, they kind of alternated in the seventh and eighth. We were upstairs in the big room in the grade school building, both grades. Bevie 3:00taught, I don't remember exactly, English and Potter taught.. . .let's see, English and History, I believe she taught. Potter taught Math. It's hard for me to remember.

C.M.: That's okay.

YOUNG: Bevie taught us English. And as I went into high school, I had 4:00Eda Kay Smith and Prof Smith, Professor Smith and Miss Standish, Pearl Combs. That's about all I can think of right off C.M.: What year did you graduate?

YOUNG: I graduated in nineteen thirty-eight.

C.M.: Did you live up at the settlement school?

YOUNG: No. I lived down here at Frogtown. Do 5:00you know where Ron Chapins lives down there now? I lived, I was born and raised in that old house across the street.

C.M.: So, you walked to school.

YOUNG: Yeah. I didn't even eat lunch at the school. I'd come home for lunch. I lived there all through .... well now, the last year we finished that hotel building downtown, and we moved down there. And I lived down there about the last year, thirty-seven, about the last year of school.

C.M.: Now, did anybody else 6:00in your family go to school up there? Up at the settlement?

YOUNG: Well, nobody stayed at the settlement. My oldest brother, Charlie, he went all the way through school. I don't know really. I guess he started. He might have been up in the grades a little bit. Then I had two sisters that went to school there. My next to oldest brother, Shelby, he went to school in Carr Creek. He didn't go to school much. But he stayed over on Carr. That's where my dad was from. And he got just about what schooling he got. He may have gone 7:00some down there, I don't remember. But the others did. My sisters .... well, one sister didn't finish. I don't remember just how far .... she quit along about the first part of high school. She got married and quit. My other sister went on through, and Charlie and me. We all went through high school down there.

C.M.: And you said you graduated in nineteen thirty-eight?

YOUNG: Thirty-eight, yeah.

C.M.: Let's just kind of talk about going to school there. What are some things you remember about being a high school student back then? I know Lib was telling me things about classes 8:00she took and teachers she liked.

YOUNG: Well, Lib, she remembers things. I.. .. she reminded me of a lot of things, and I remembered after that.

C.M.: Well, maybe what were some of your favorite classes? Maybe that will help you. Classes that you took that kind of stood out in your mind.

YOUNG: I like History pretty well. I took that under Eda Kay Smith. And some Science classes I liked. I had Miss Standish for part of them. And Pearl Combs, I don't remember just what, I believe it was Algebra that 9:00I had under Pearl. I had Geometry under Jeb Smith, Professor Smith.

C.M.: Did you take the Manual Training class?

YOUNG: Yeah, I liked that. That was .... Jethro Amburgey taught that.

C.M.: What was that like?

YOUNG: Well, we just did carpentry work. I mean learned carpentry, is what it was. We made little things. I built a dresser and a couple of bookshelves. He built a lot of dulcimers, 10:00during the class, you know.

C.M.: He built them during class? You saw him build them?

YOUNG: I saw him working on them. He had the shop in there, and he'd bring his work with him sometime. And he'd do a lot of work there. We watched him work on that some. And we just learned all the tools, you know, and how to use them and built small things.

C.M.: What kind of person 11:00was Jethro Amburgey? His personality?

YOUNG: I liked him. He was a pretty good fellow. I knew him. He had a twin brother that lived next door to me, when I was growing up. They lived there a while. Woodrow Amburgey was his twin brother, to Jethro. I knew him and his family well. Jethro, I didn't live close to him, just contact in school is about all I had with him.

C.M.: Did he ever teach you all how to make the dulcimers?

YOUNG: No, that was his .... he made that. My 12:00boy bought that for me, close to the last one he made. I bought a couple from him for different ones. That last, my boy, Bob, bought that one for me, for some kind of Christmas present or something. He plays them and has a dozen or more, I guess. I never could play it much.

C.M.: Do you think that class you were in, that Manual Training class. Do you think that was helpful to you later in life?

YOUNG: Oh yeah. 13:00I learned a lot there. They had .... our Manual Training class was in an old building. They called it, let's see, what did they call that? It was where the first power plant.. .. they had a thirty-two volt power plant. And they had a steam engine in there. They ran a lot of stuff with steam. It burned down. But they had that mostly for the school. They branched out for a little bit. We got it for a little while. We'd have it up to about nine-thirty at night and then they would shut it off. When 14:00that old building burned down, they built another one in there then. That was after I had shop there. They moved it out there in one of those log cabins.

C.M.: The Manual Training?

YOUNG: Yeah, below the grade school building. There was two log cabins out there. One of them was used earlier for some kind of classroom. And then the cabin, they just called it, "The Cabin", people stayed there. They lived there, some of the teachers. After that building burned, they moved the shop out there in one of those cabins. I did go a little bit there, right up there towards the last. But I took 15:00it one, maybe two days a week. When I was in the eighth grade we got to go to Manual Training.

C.M.: Was that just for the boys?

YOUNG: Yeah. I don't think they ever .... they may in later years, let some of the girls go. That old cabin there .... well, there was two cabins, side by side. And then they had a big garden in behind it. Old man Doc Pratt worked 16:00there. He tended the garden for the school. They had a big barn and they had cattle. They had about nine or ten head of cattle, cows, milk cows. And they would take them up that hollow to the pasture every day. And some of the boys who took care of them would go up and get them and bring them. They'd have to block the road and bring them across the road, down the lane there to the barn. The boys would milk them and carry the milk over to the kitchen, over where the May Stone building is. They 17:00called it the kitchen. I remember about the Eastover house up on the hill, where that block building is now. They had ... .in that old .... well, I don't know. I guess they had the pump there then too. After they rebuilt that building, where they had their steam engine, boiler. They had a big, old pump there. And they would pump water back up on top of the hill up there. And they had a big reservoir up there. They had a gauge, as it lowered they could feed it from the pump out down there.

C.M.: Was 18:00that so they could have running water?

YOUNG: That was for the school, yes. They had pipes in the buildings. And they had a little house up there, they called the Rest House, or Rest Home or something. You'd get out and you'd walk up there and just sit around and rest. That sat there for a long time. It finally rotted down. And I don't know whether they ever filled in that reservoir or what.

C.M.: No, it's still up there.

YOUNG: Is it still open?

C.M.: Yes. Was there any .... oh, I'm sorry. Were there any other classes you remembered that 19:00you enjoyed? Or teachers maybe?

YOUNG: Well, there's a lot of people that didn't like Eda Kay Smith, but I did.

C.M.: Why didn't people like her?

YOUNG: She was just. ... kind of had a hateful attitude sometimes. And children would get in a fuss with her, you know. And they just didn't like her much. And I did. She was an old-fashioned kind of woman. She'd talk slow. Anytime I ever asked her any questions or anything, she would try her best to answer me with them. I just liked her for that. Now, Jim Still came 20:00while I was ... .I was about a freshman, I guess, when he came there. And I think the second year, maybe my second year in high school, I took typing under him and Library Science. He taught, they called it Library Science, how to use the library and all. I liked that pretty well.

C.M.: How did Mr. Still get along with the students and things?

YOUNG: Who?

C.M.: Mr. Still.

YOUNG: All right, I think. I never knew of him fussing with any of them.

C.M.: Well 21:00what.. .. oh, go ahead.

YOUNG: There were some teachers there that I didn't have classes under. I didn't know much about them.

C.M.: What are some of the things that you all used to do, or maybe just things that you did? Were you in any clubs or things that maybe you all did after school? Activities that you were involved in because of school?

YOUNG: No, we didn't have too much of that kind of stuff I was never on a team, but I played ball some. We had, 22:00used to .... be too small to play on now, I guess, that old gym. It burned down a few years ago. They rebuilt it, I think and cut it up into classrooms. They built a bridge across, right in front of the old high school, that I used coming down from home. We didn't have to go all the way around to get there. They had a bridge across there.

C.M.: Was it just a walking bridge?

YOUNG: Well, 23:00yeah. It had steps up to it. It was a good, wide bridge. You had to walk up steps to get on it. And then it went over to the hill over there.

C.M.: I guess one thing we're looking for too, is. We're just trying to get an idea of what it was like around here right then and going to school there. And you didn't live on campus, like you said. Maybe there's stories or things that stick out in your head that I haven't asked you about. Or just something about that time.

YOUNG: I just can't think of anything special that happened. I 24:00know they're always having some kind of activities that we'd go to, school plays. We used to have a lot of fun with them, when we had plays in school.

C.M.: What sort of plays?

YOUNG: I was never much of an actor. [Laughing] C.M.: What sort of plays did you all do?

YOUNG: We had .... Thanksgiving was one of the biggest ones outside of Christmas. We always had a Christmas program. I remember in sixth or seventh grade, I guess it was. We had a Thanksgiving program. And I 25:00was Squanto the Indian, was the part I had. [Laughing] That's just about all I can remember about it. There was nearly always something going on like that. I just can't remember it all now.

C.M.: That's okay. What kind of impact has going to the settlement school had on your life? Graduating from there, and you went to school all through up there. So, what has that meant to you?

YOUNG: Well, it's meant a whole lot. I got 26:00what education I have, I got it there. Like you say, I didn't have anything much to do with the settlement. There was always a crowd there, and I was over there with the boys that lived over there, and a lots of stuff like that. But I never had any part in staying over there. I worked sometimes when I was just young, mostly in the eighth grade, I think when 27:00I started. In the summertime I would go down there and work, cut grass or anything that they had to do. I worked for Miss Burns, was the boss.

C.M.: What was she like?

YOUNG: She was a pretty rough one. She was all right. I liked her. We got along good. Orville Sloane, he was Morton Sloane's boy, that worked there at the settlement for years and years, Mort did. And Orville's oldest boy did a lot of work around there too. He was killed in the war, Orville was. He 28:00and I worked together most of the time. Miss Burns, we were the only ones she could trust. She'd give us a job and send us off by ourselves somewhere. Some of them that worked, she'd have to stand right over them. [Laughing] But she took care of the barn and the milking of the cows after she came there. Jeez, I don't know how long. She was there for a long time.

C.M.: Well, I'm trying to think if there is anything else we missed.

END OF INTERVIEW