Oral History Interview with Tressie Messer

CASSIE MULLINS: Let's get going. And if you don't care, just.. .. if you don't mind telling me your .... just state your name out loud and your age, so we'll have it on here.

TRESSIE MESSER: I'm Tressie Messer and I'm seventy-six years old. And I live at Leburn, Kentucky.

C.M.: And we'll also start out, what year did you graduate?

MESSER: I graduated from old Hindman High School in nineteen thirty-eight. We were the largest class that had ever finished there. There were forty of us.

C.M.: That is a big class.

MESSER: Only forty though, just think what it is today.

C.M.: Yeah.

MESSER: I stayed in the Hindman Settlement School. I went there when I was twelve years old. I was ready for high school, but they wouldn't take any children that weren't in high school. So, I spent two years with my uncle and aunt, Dan and Elizabeth Prather, up in Frog Town. And when I got ready for high school, then they accepted me down at the settlement school. And I spent the next four years there.

C.M.: Living on campus?

MESSER: Living on campus and most of the Summer. I stayed there and worked. We only got ten cents an hour, but you know you'd be surprised how that added up. I would have almost enough money to buy my material to have my clothes made to wear for the following fall. And it was just. ... Well staying at the settlement school was really a bright spot in my life. A very big, big thing in my life. Because we lived in Quicksand, very remote. And there's no way that I could have gone to high school, and you know, finished my four years there, had I not been able to stay in the settlement school.

C.M.: How did you know about the settlement school? How did you hear about it?

MESSER: I guess everybody pretty well knew about it. I guess we were the first children from my family to go to it. Our mother was determined. Our father worked away in the mines. She was determined that we get an education. She ... .I guess we just always knew about it. Soon as she could, she saw to it that we went. And so there were eleven of us. Really, I'm a child of fifteen, but four died very young, you know. And eleven of us grew to be grown. So we just knew about. .. .I guess everybody just knew about the settlement school.

C.M.: Who else in your family went to school there?

MESSER: Well, I had Mary Ruth, my sister and my sister, Jessie. Now they didn't like it as much as I did. And they didn't stay all the time. And my brother, James and my brother, Paul and my brother, Walter. I guess that's all.

C.M.: So, you all went to school there, at some point.

MESSER: The ones I mentioned. Now my parents moved out of Quicksand before the smaller children were ready to go to high school, Willie and Wilma and Eve. I guess you know Willie Prather, my brother. I guess I shouldn't say that on ....

C.M.: Oh, it doesn't matter.

MESSER: But anyway, they moved out, because there was sort of gap. A group of children, then there's a little gap here and then three more. So, they didn't want them to leave home, and moved over to Hindman. And they lived over there until they died. Now the other children didn't, they just didn't like it. But I loved it, I really did. I just loved it. And I think it meant a lot to me. It helped me in a lot of ways.

C.M.: What kind of ways is that?

MESSER: I was a little child in sixth grade when I came to live with my uncle and his wife. You see I was taught after I went to the settlement school so many things. Because each semester, and I stayed four years. We were assigned a new job, every student there. And they wanted you to cover all the bases, you might say. And we really learned how, I mean you know, just to set a table properly. I hadn't even learned that you know. And then they had the Practice Home, or you might call it the hospital. I don't know. I guess they've torn that building down, haven't they? Well, sort of an infirmary thing. And if kids got sick, they could go up there, you know. In fact, I had my tonsils removed there. A Dr. Brown from Hazard came over and it didn't cost me anything. And I just sat up in a chair and he snipped them out. He deadened them, you know and all. But I could hear those snip, snip, snips.

C.M.: Ohhh. Ooooh.

MESSER: I hope I don't bother ....

C.M.: Oh no, it doesn't bother me. [Laughter]

MESSER: But I could. And that's where I had my tonsils removed. But anyway, you had to stay up there. If you were there for four years, you had to put in one semester at Practice Home. You were just practicing as if you were running a home. We didn't, the girls .... there were six of us, that stayed there.

C.M.: And you lived there?

MESSER: You lived there. They had a house mother and a house father, Mr. and Mrs. Potter. And then we did our own cooking, cleaning and all the work, we did it. And it sort of.. . .it helps you to learn how to do, just our home really. Then in the dining hall, everybody put in a semester. Some of us put more than one in. And Miss Elkins, now she was really, she was really precious to me. And she taught me. She helped me so much. And she was over in the dining hall. And she saw to it that you did it just right. You didn't mess around. Of course, some of them didn't like that. She was picky, you know. And then I spent one semester ... . I got up in the morning and helped. They had cooks. But they had some of the students help. And I got up and helped prepare breakfast. So, they wanted you to touch all the bases, you know. To learn how .... then I worked out on the grounds some. They had their own dairy, you know. They had their own cattle, cows. Mrs. Bums was the lady in charge of that, Mrs. Martha Bums. And they had their barn and everything, you know. The boys did the milking, and we had a pasteurizer. And we pasteurized our own milk. It was located down in part of the kitchen. Under the old Orchard House is where it was, before they built May Stone. And so, we always .... they pasteurized the milk. It was really, real good. And so, I don't know. I just liked it. I really did. But not everybody will say that.

C.M.: Yeah.

MESSER: They sure won't. You can ask me some questions.

C.M.: Oh, I will. I just didn't want to interrupt you. That's just fine.

MESSER: I mean I may rattle on too much. And if I do, stop me.

C.M.: Oh no, you're doing just fine. Let's see, you were talking about living on campus. That's one thing I'm real interested in, because like you said there's a lot of people, I can talk to in Knott County who didn't live at the settlement. They walked in. What was it like? Like your room, like where you slept and things.

MESSER: Oh, well, we had our room and sometimes there were two in a room. It depended on the room. Sometimes there were as many as four. And you had bunk beds, you know. We had to keep our room clean, and it was inspected. Miss Elkins inspected our room every day. She sure did. And if it wasn't made, the bed ... .if the sheets weren't tucked .... done hospital style, you did it over. Now that's right. She was real, real strict, but I think that meant a lot to me. Maybe right at that time .... but I never felt she was pushing me too hard. But it may be that some of them thought it was a little too much. But I can see where it wasn't. I think it was a great help.

C.M.: What time did you all have to go to bed and things like that? Or get up?

MESSER: Well, we had to go to bed at night at nine thirty. And on Sunday we had what was called quiet hour. And we had to rest, lie down and rest or be quiet at least for one hour. Let's see, two to three is what I believe it was. And I can remember we would be lying on our beds, watching outside, you know. We would be quiet. When Betty Combs first. ... you knew her, didn't you?

C.M.: Yes.

MESSER: When she first came there .... oh, we thought she was the most beautiful person. She came from Cleveland. And she was just all so pretty and everything. And she and Pearl Combs were dating. We would watch from our room every Sunday. And they would go out for a drive or something. He'd walk her back up. She lived up at the hospital. And he'd walk her up through there. I just thought they were the most. ... oh, they were just perfect. They were a perfect couple. We all thought that. We just loved to see them going walking up. Now that was really a highlight to the girls watching. And soon they married.

C.M.: What were any other rules that you remember maybe, that you had to follow because you lived there?

MESSER: Oh, we couldn't go to town, except we had to have .... maybe twice a week we were allowed to go to town. And we checked out and we checked back in. And we were only supposed to be gone so long. And we were not allowed to go into .... they had .... they did sell spirits in Hindman at that time. And we were not allowed ... .I don't guess anybody really wanted to go into those places. And they had these juke boxes, and they were going strong at that time. And so, I don't think they put any restrictions on us, except just we couldn't be gone too long. But we couldn't go .... but I think it was twice a day, I mean a week. And then on Sunday we always went to church. We had the Baptist and the Methodist church. And some of the teachers went to the Methodist, some to the Baptist. So, they chaperoned each group, you know, and took us to church. I know Miss Watts always went to the Baptist, most of the time and took us. That's where I always went. In fact, that's where I was saved. Not in the old building, it soon fell off its posts, but up in the courthouse. We were holding services up there. But they did. And now on Sunday night we had what was called Christian Endeavor.

C.M.: What was that?

MESSER: Well, all the students gathered at seven, six thirty, I believe it was. We had .... we read. We had pamphlets that had been run off and we read in unison and so forth, that night. And different people would speak, different students, more from the senior class of that year. They would do most of the speaking. And we'd sing. And you know, I just loved that. I thought that.. . .I remember it to this day, so distinctly, meeting you know, and everything. Not all the teachers came, but a lot of them did. But Miss Watts was in charge of it.

C.M.: What was that called?

MESSER: Christian Endeavors. So, we read some chapters just from the Bible. Different ones were called on, you know, to read and things of that nature. We didn't have an evening meal on Sunday, as we did the other days of the week. We had a real good Sunday lunch; dinner is what I call it. Anyway, that night, the girls that worked in the kitchen would prepare .... the cooks didn't have to work that evening. They'd prepare sandwiches, just different kind of sandwiches, and fruit. We always had an apple or something like that, and sandwiches. And take .... we knew how many students for each building. And we'd put them in baskets and take them to each building and they would have their own meal there. Their house mother would take care of it until they got ready to eat. And they'd have their meal there on Sundays.

C.M.: Well, that seems kind of nice.

MESSER: That's the way we did it. They didn't have to mess up the dining hall and all of that, you know. Have all of that dish washing. [Laughing]

C.M.: What about your other meals? What were meals like? Eating all together.

MESSER: Well, we always .... everybody was expected to be present when mealtime came. And there would be a teacher at the head of the table to do the serving. And one at the end, and sometimes there happened to be one over on the side. Sometimes there were three teachers if we needed more space and all. In the morning we would have .... most of the .... we’ll all winter months we had hot cereal, cream of wheat or oatmeal, one. And they brought it up in .... they cooked it and put it in a metal... .it was a pretty container with a lid on it. She took the lid off it and the steam; you could just see it come up. And the one who served at the head of the table, served your cereal, and passed it down to you. And then you had eggs, scrambled eggs most of the time and sausage or bacon. And we had biscuits, beaten biscuits. Now I've never eaten any biscuits that anyone's ever made, that tasted like theirs.

C.M.: What were they like? Everybody talks about them.

MESSER: They were flaky like, just. Oh, they were just out of this world. And I never could make them. I really tried, but I couldn't. They just.. .. you'd run them through that.. .. see we had a .... all we had was a little, sort of like an old-time wringer type washer. And we'd run that back and forth, that pastry, you know, after we go it mixed. Back and forth, back and forth. But now they were .... somebody else might be able to tell you more about the biscuits than I could. But they sure were good.

C.M.: That's what everybody says.

MESSER: Yeah, but I don't know how to make them. I wish I did. I've never eaten anymore like them. Miss Elkins was the one who made them. She's the one that figured out how to make those. She kept working at it, until she perfected it. It was really perfect.

C.M.: What other kinds of foods did you all eat?

MESSER: Oh, we had lots of vegetables. See they grew their own garden. We had lots of vegetables and they were good. And we had meat. The settlement, they didn't grow enough to do them. We had enough to have on the table mostly. But to prepare and put away for the winter we didn't can or whatever. So, John Vernon Jones' mother would .... she must have canned and raised a terrible lot of food. She would bring it by wagon. And I can just see her now. And she would have that wagon full of canned food. She sold it to the settlement, you know. And they would buy anything. People picked berries. They would buy those. We'd have berry pie and berry cobbler, and what have you. And apples. People brought apples and sold them to them. But I remember John Vernon's mother, (??) Jones, bringing her wagon. And she'd just have lots of potatoes and canned foods. And of course, they didn't. ... everything was so cheap then, sort of depression times. It was thirty-four, but you know things were down then. Everything was cheap, but it was hard to get a hold of money. You didn't have it.

C.M.: Let's see, what else? When you were in high school, I guess, since that's mainly when you lived on campus, right?

MESSER: Pardon?

C.M.: Did you mainly live on campus when you were in high school?

MESSER: All through high school. Sixth and seventh grades, I was at my uncle's.

C.M.: What classes do you remember taking? What were the classes?

MESSER: I took typing under Mr. Still. And I took French under Miss Standish. And I took Home Ee under Mrs. Potter. And Miss Standish taught me English too. And Pearl Combs taught me Math, all my math, geometry, and everything. And Eda Kay Smith taught me History. She's not been gone too long.

C.M.: What classes were your favorites? Or do you remember liking them?

MESSER: Well, I think I like English real well and I liked History too. And I didn't like Math. [Laughter]

C.M.: I don't like it either.

MESSER: I really didn't like it, but it was part of it, had to do it. Trying to think. I enjoyed Home Ee, you know, while I was taking it. Of course, I didn't do anything with it. Made a few .... sewed a few .... learned to make a few things, a few garments. Never followed up. Well, I just wasn't that gifted. I think you're kind of gifted to that.

C.M.: I think so too. It's hard.

MESSER: And I'm not. Well, I've cooked a lot in my lifetime, though don't do much now.

C.M.: Who were some of.. .. you were telling me about some of your teachers, that you liked or remembered.

MESSER: Well, I like them all. I didn't have any problem with them.

C.M.: Which ones kind of stand out in your mind, maybe? Tell me about them. Like Mr. Still, you had him for typing. What was he like?

MESSER: Yeah, he was the nicest. Oh, he just couldn't be nicer. He was just so kind to you. I had hardly seen a typewriter or anything. But anyway, he would show us what to do. And we had assignments and we had to practice a lot, you know, how you do in typing. Write the same thing over and over again. He wouldn't stand right over your shoulder and make you nervous or anything like that. He was real kind and nice. We've all, my husband and I, we've always been good friends to Mr. Still. Before my husband passed away, they were always good friends. And I liked Miss Standish. She was just a wonderful person.

C.M.: What was she like?

MESSER: Well, she was just one of those people. She was just always bubbling over. She was ready to help you with anything that you need help in. And so, I just thought a lot of her. I had French under her, and she was real good to us. She knew that we didn't hardly know what was going on when we first started. And so, she was so nice to us. Well, they were all pretty much, most of them were nice. You'd have a few. [Laughter]

C.M.: Well, yeah, that happens.

MESSER: I didn't have a lot of complaints about my teachers.

C.M.: What did people think? I know that a lot of these teachers were from up east.

MESSER: Yeah, they were, most all of them.

C.M.: They weren't from around here. People don't like that too much. What did people think about that?

MESSER: Well, you know, I don't think that they really thought that much about it. Miss Manzart, now I remember she was there at grade school. She was one of the teachers. And she was from Massachusetts. And they just came from hither and yon. I never did .... now she was teaching in the grade school, but you know I never heard any grade school, any people ever say anything, you know, parents.

C.M.: Yeah, I just wasn't sure. I was trying to get like a feel for what people thought.

MESSER: No. I guess because Miss Watts, Miss Stone and Miss Pettit came in and they started all this. And they were so happy I guess, to have this school, the people around, you know. And (??) gave them property. Now I think that's right. I know it was the three ladies, Miss Stone, Miss Pettit, and Miss Watts. And I knew all of them. And Miss Cobb. Oh, she was the sweetest thing there ever was, Miss Cobb was. She taught Latin and she taught some English classes too. And she was just precious. She lived .... she had red hair and I always wished that my hair .. .. and her hair turned just as white as could be. And I always just prayed for mine to turn and be like hers. But it didn't. And it's not going to, I don't think. But of course, she lived up about ninety years. And Miss Stone's hair was beautiful. It was white.

C.M.: And you knew Miss Stone?

MESSER: Oh yes

C.M.: What was she like?

MESSER: Oh, she was a lovely lady. She didn't say much. And she didn't have as much going with the students, as Miss Watts did, you know. Because she was gone most of her time. But I went up and cleaned up at Hillside, where she and Miss Watts lived, one semester. And I learned more about her that way. But she was just the most pleasant person, that you'd ever want to see. She really was. Now Miss Watts was more stem. She had that eye.

C.M.: Tell me about Miss Watts.

MESSER: Well, Miss Watts, now I thought she was really, really nice. But she sure could get you .... just by looking at you. Did you know Miss Watts?

C.M.: Yeah, I knew her really well.

MESSER: She sure .... did you ever notice anything about her?

C.M.: I guess I knew her.. .. she was so much older.

MESSER: Oh, I see.

C.M.: And of course, I never knew her when she was actually running things.

MESSER: Well, she had all that responsibility about us children. She was over that. And if you did something that wasn't just exactly right, you knew about it right away. Because you were called up to her office, absolutely. Any why did you do that, you know. Boy, she just pierced .... her eyes were just piercing you. [Laughing]

C.M.: What kind of job do you think she did running the settlement?

MESSER: Oh, I think she did a wonderful job. I don't know of anybody else could have hardly handled it at the time with such low funds as they had. It was all gifts and everything, sent in from away. So, I don't know. I don't know if anybody else could have done it or not. I was there. Well, when she resigned, I was at the meeting. See, I taught Kindergarten for her after I got up. My son was born. I didn't teach. I taught Kindergarten, it was just half a day, for the settlement school for three years. So, she asked me to come to this meeting. That's when she resigned. You know what? That just hurt me real, real deep. Mr. McClain was taking over, she said. She wanted to announce and tell everybody that he was coming on.

C.M.: Okay, hang on a second. Let me turn this.

END OFT APE 20 A 8, TRESSIE MESSER , SIDE A

BEGINNING OF TAPE 20 A 8, TRESSIE MESSER , SIDE B

MESSER: I think, I don't think I ever saw Miss Pettit. Just pictures of her, was all I ever saw. She didn't.. . . I don't think she was around after I went there. I went there the year thirty-four – thirty-five. And I graduated in thirty-seven - thirty-eight. I graduated in thirty-eight you know, but it was that year. So, I never knew her. But I knew Miss Cobb and Miss Watts and Miss Stone real well. And Miss Cobb always slept out on .... they had a little porch. I think she'd had a little problem in her life. I don't know what. I just wouldn't want to say what it was. But she slept. They had a screened in porch and she slept out there all winter.

C.M.: In the cold?

MESSER: Well, she kept herself covered well. But she needed this air, fresh air.

C.M.: So, she slept on the porch?

MESSER: Yes, she did. That's the only person I knew. Now as far as I know she did all winter long. Because I was up there a lot and she'd sleep out there.

C.M.: Did you girls ever get. ... going back to when you lived up there. Did you girls ever get into any mischief or anything? Or things like that? Maybe just things that you all did together? Or just things that you remember about being up there?

MESSER: Well now I know .... you know we were allowed to go to ball games. We were chaperoned. That was our biggest outlet, was going to the ball games during the ball season.

But Miss Elkins, she wasn't a chaperon, but she'd stand right there and look out the window to see who walked you home. Of course, you had a chaperon. And if she didn't approve of the person who walked you home, then you heard about it. [Laughing]

C.M.: What would she do?

MESSER: Well, she'd just call you up to her .... she'd find a good time. And she'd tell you that she didn't think he was the right person for you to be seeing. [Laughter] We all got real tickled about that. She'd always watch, just watch. She wanted us to let a settlement boy walk us home. If you had a town boy, she'd say something to you. Yeah, she sure would. She was real funny. He's not the person you should be walking home with, not the one you should let walk you home.

C.M.: Did anybody ever get mad at her?

MESSER: Oh yeah, plenty of them got mad at her. I guess I was real, real fond of her, because she, I don't know. She just treated me like I was her own daughter really. That's the truth. But some of them, she didn't treat hardly so good. Of course, I did whatever she told me to do. I guess that made a difference. She was a real, fine lady. She had a lot of good qualities that she passed on. If you would have absorbed them, you'd learn a lot from her.

C.M.: You were talking earlier when we first started doing this. You made a comment that the settlement had just meant so much to you. A bright spot.

MESSER: It has.

C.M.: Tell me about that.

MESSER: Well, if I hadn't gotten to go there, I probably ... . doubt if I could have gone through high school. And then that would have meant the whole thing, as far as I'm concerned, you know. Because that lead on to going further on. And I was able to teach until I retired. And I just feel like I really ... .it made me a better person, I really do.

C.M.: How do you think it did that?

MESSER: Well, I had wonderful parents, there's no doubt. But my father had to live .... he stayed away most of the time working in the mines to make a little money. (??) He couldn't stay at home. My mother, she just had so much to do. And she was one of the most wonderful mothers you'd ever know. She worked so hard. But it was hard for her with eleven children. She had to see that we got to school and that we got something to eat and all of that. And the settlement school was really .... it just meant a lot to me, because I feel like, as I said, I think it made me a better person. It made me understand how to .... of course, I had a large family to live with. But you need to learn how to live with those that are not your family, too. And I learned how to do that. I never had much of a problem with that though. I just learned how to do so many things, that I would have never learned otherwise. I feel like I got good training, that's the main thing.

C.M.: How do you think the settlement affected just this area, from living here your whole

life? Seeing the things that go on.

MESSER: It really .... it helped me an awful lot. We had children come from Floyd County, Perry County, back through there, Leatherwood, back that way, Leslie, and Letcher County. We had an awful lot. And Floyd County, McDowell, we had people come that way. I just had a lot of friends that came back from Leatherwood. So, it just meant an awful lot to everybody. They lived so far. Where I grew up, you'd have to, you know, sometimes you might get a ride in the back of a truck or something over to Vest from Hindman. And sometimes you might walk it. Then you'd go a little past, up by the (??) school and across the mountains. When I went home, that was the only way I could go home.

C.M.: How long did it take you?

MESSER: Oh, I don't know how long. I'd cross that mountain up by the cemetery. There was a big cemetery. And I never will forget, when I'd get.. . .I’d be walking and it would always get dark on me. And when I'd get up to the cemetery, I'd just fly. [Laughter]

C.M.: I don't blame you.

MESSER: I don't know why I was running. Not now I don't. But at that time, I could just hear things. Why it would take me a long, long time. Most of the time though I would get a way down to Vest with Tom Sutton. And then I'd walk on. You've never been over there. It's called Baker.

C.M.: I haven't been there.

MESSER: Have you been down to Quicksand any? Over where the Patrick’s live?

C.M.: Yeah.

MESSER: Have you been there?

C.M.: Yeah

MESSER: Well, just a little way below there, to the left is a hollow and we lived about a mile and a half up that hollow.

C.M.: You did live way out there.

MESSER: And that's where we lived and that's where we grew up, until....soon as we got big enough that our mother could get us in the settlement. She'd move us off. We had to walk all that way out of that hollow about a mile and a half each way to school down there, Baker's school. And she just felt like a one room school and everything .... she felt like we weren't getting what we needed.

C.M.: Well, I've asked you all my questions. I don't know if there's maybe something I haven't asked you or that I've left out that maybe you feel is important. That's popped into your mind while we've been talking.

MESSER: Sometimes I think about things. I should have written down things. Sometimes I.. .. oh, when we graduated, we were not allowed graduating gowns. We didn't have caps and gowns. I guess that would have been too expensive for us. We were supposed to have a white dress and white shoes. And Miss Elkins, she grew these beautiful flowers. She had, she called them borders. There'd be a walkway where you crossed the bridge, there coming from May Stone. You'd go up through there and there was a little path. She called it a border and she'd have peonies all up and down. Of course, they don't have that now. But at graduation time now, she had them ready. And each girl carried three I believe, with their white dress. And I just always thought that was real pretty. And it was simple, very simple. The boys just wore a white shirt and dark pants, you know, like that. But then they started a few years later wearing caps and gowns. That was in nineteen thirty-eight.

C.M.: I'll turn this off.

END OF INTERVIEW