Interview with Bernice McDonald

ANN COX: This is Ann Cox interviewing Bernice McDonald on October 11, 2003. [tape goes off and on]…that’s it, okay. Now it’s writing, okay, which means it is.

BERNICE McDONALD: Okay. Record something then play it back.

AC: Well, the thing is. . .

McDONALD: Oh, you can’t do that?

AC: Yeah, I have to have headphones to listen to it.

McDONALD: Oh, okay. You told me that. 1:00[tape goes off and on] AC: …but if this isn’t a good time because of. . .

McDONALD: Whatever you think. You can ask me some questions, whatever you like. If you like.

AC: Are you sure?

McDONALD: Yeah, and then you can do it, like, maybe a more extensive one some other time. Or whatever you like. Come here Cricket and quit that!

AC: Okay, I’ll just ask you a few things.

McDONALD: Can you see?

AC: Yeah.

McDONALD: You got enough light?

AC: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Okay. All right. Okay, let’s see. Tell me what year you were born?

McDONALD: 1945.

AC: Where were you born?

McDONALD: Breathitt County.

AC: In Jackson?

McDONALD: Jackson, Kentucky.

AC: Okay. Were you born in Eva’s house?

McDONALD: Yes. My mother’s and father’s.

AC: Okay, can you tell me about 2:00the different places you’ve lived since you were born?

McDONALD: Actually, I’ve only lived two, there, in Breathitt County, I lived in Frankfort for a couple of years and then in Lexington. Three.

AC: Okay, how long did you live in Breathitt County when you lived there?

McDONALD: Until I was sixteen.

AC: What made you want to move? Why did you move?

McDONALD: That’s a good question. I went to live with my aunt in Frankfort. I got a job. That’s why I moved, I guess.

AC: What was it like growing up there?

McDONALD: Nice. ( ) Lots of kids. 3:00AC: Did you all live together?

McDONALD: Yes, with exception of my oldest sister. She spent a lot of time with our grandparents.

AC: Did your grandparents live there until they died?

McDONALD: No, actually they didn’t. They moved away about, maybe six years before my grandfather died because it was so hard for them to get in and out, you know, because there was no road through there and they were older by this time.

AC: Can you just describe what the house and the neighborhood was like 4:00where you grew up?

McDONALD: Country. Real country, no roads. I can remember when we didn’t have electricity. No bathroom, no running water, real old, you know, way back in the country. Country country.

AC: How many siblings do you have?

McDONALD: Seven sisters and three brothers.

AC: Are they all, were you the oldest, or. . .

McDONALD: No.

AC: Oh, okay.

McDONALD: I have two older sisters. I’m the third down from the top.

AC: So, Hazel. . .

McDONALD: Hazel, Myrtle, and me.

AC: O.k. 5:00How did your parents make a living?

McDONALD: They farmed and lived off my grandfather. My grandfather, you know, was the head of the family. He supported his family, our family. All of us; kids, grandkids.

AC: What did he do to support you?

McDONALD: Farm, I’m told. Maybe bootlegged. [laughter] A little bit of everything, whatever.

AC: Okay. [scratching sound] Do you need to get to her? Okay. [laughing] When you were living there did you see a lot of people leave that area?

McDONALD: You know, not then, no. I don’t remember. . . My father’s family, his sisters, and his brothers, they left, but my father never did. 6:00AC: Do you remember as you were growing up, before you left to live with your aunt and Uncle, any sort of changes that were going on in the area as you were growing up?

McDONALD: What kind of changes?

AC: Changes maybe in the way people lived.

McDONALD: You mean where they worked?

AC: Where they worked or maybe how their, what each member of the family did? 7:00McDONALD: You mean, like, if they were married? If their kids got married? You know, I think kids tended, in eastern Kentucky people tended to marry young. You know, girls married. They didn’t worry about education. Girls married, the guys went to work at the service stations and RC Cola plant, the coal mines. That kind of change, yeah.

AC: Were more women working? Did more women start working?

McDONALD: Women didn’t used to work. They, you know, in the fifties and even the early sixties girls were taught from really young to like, catch a good husband, then they don’t have to work. 8:00You know, this type of thing. I guess that carried on over into the sixties and maybe on into the early seventies. It’s not that way anymore. Most of the girls in Eastern Kentucky believe it or not go to college now.

AC: Mm-hmm. Do most of them go to colleges around that area?

McDONALD: No, most of them leave. Most of them go to UK or Morehead, you know, MSU, West Virginia, Virginia. There’s a community college, Lees, some of them go there. From what I understand they have a good vocational program there.

AC: How long were you in school?

McDONALD: I graduated from high school.

AC: Okay. Was that Breathitt County?

McDONALD: Mm-hmm.

AC: Do you remember anything about Marie Turner? Or was that before your time?

McDONALD: No, actually my older sister Hazel’s named for her.

AC: Oh really?

McDONALD: Hazel Marie. 9:00AC: Oh, okay.

McDONALD: Yeah, she was the superintendent, Breathitt County super-intendent before, while I was in school. You didn’t know that? That my sister. . .

AC: Oh, no, I didn’t know she was named after her.

McDONALD: Hazel Marie.

AC: Oh, okay.

McDONALD: And my brother Irvin was named for her husband Irvin Turner. Yeah, you didn’t know that I guess. Well, I don’t know how you would have known that [laughter]. Thought maybe your mother told you.

AC: Yeah. It sounds like something she would have told me.

McDONALD: She ( ) Hazel Marie.

AC: So, when you said your aunts and uncles left but your father. . .

McDONALD: My father’s family, you know, his brother, his brothers and his sisters left. But you know, a lot more of my grandfather’s family, a lot of them are still there. 10:00Well, they’re, they’re all still in Breathitt County, but they’re not all, you know, right immediately where we lived. Where are property is, they’re not in that tiny area anymore. They are all still in Breathitt County.

AC: Why do you think some people chose to stay and some people chose to leave?

McDONALD: Well, I think is has something to do with being from Eastern Kentucky. Once you’re born and raised there you would go back, you know, if there was [were] just jobs. Everybody loves it. Everybody that’s from there, you know, just love it. There’s just something about the mountains. A lot, I’ve known people who have been away for forty years and moved back after they retire, you know they go to the city for jobs and then retire and move back after forty years and they’re really happy. There’s just something about Eastern Kentucky. I guess 11:00you can take the country out of a person, how does it go? You can take a person out of the country but not the country out of the person. Okay, next. [laughter] AC: Did you feel like when you lived there, or even now, that there’s a big sense of community in Jackson?

McDONALD: Yes, everybody know[s] everybody else.

AC: Okay. Do most people, are churches a big community thing?

McDONALD: Yes, there’s a lot of young people in church too, churches are compromised [comprised] mostly, I think, of younger people. In my current church, our youth group is like, there’s probably thirty people in our youth group but in the churches, 12:00when I go up to the house there’s probably half the congregation is teenagers. I think people put their kids in church and they stay. That’s a good thing.

AC: Was the church experience there different than it is here in Lexington?

McDONALD: No. No, it’s still Baptist. You know, it’s Baptist everywhere. It’s much the same.

AC: Do you think when people, like the large amount of people who left, like, when my mom’s parents left in the forties and in the fifties. . .

McDONALD: Actually, they moved 13:00from one hollow to another one. They didn’t leave the county or even area, they just moved out of one hollow to where the main road, where they had better access to, you know, transportation, you know, you can get around better ’cause they were old by this time. You know, they never left the area. I don’t think my grandfather was ever out of Eastern Kentucky.

AC: But when my mom’s parents left it was in the forties and I guess that’s when lots of people were leaving, in the forties and fifties?

McDONALD: Actually, your mothers’ grandparents, that, like I said, they never left the area, they never, they just moved from the hollow, which had no road, out to the main road. 14:00So, they never left eastern Kentucky.

AC: But my mom’s parents. Sorry, was I saying grandparents?

McDONALD: You said your mother’s grandma.

AC: Oh, sorry. I mean my grandparents.

McDONALD: You mean your grandparents?

AC: Yeah.

McDONALD: No, I think your mother, I think your grandparents, your mother’s mother, I don’t think she left eastern Kentucky until she graduated maybe from at least high school or college. I think Aunt Grace went to college. I don’t think she left Eastern Kentucky until she met your grandfather. Yeah, they married and then left, I think. Basically, from what I can remember mom talking about.

AC: And when they left, I mean I’ve read in history books that that’s when lots of people were leaving.

McDONALD: I would think that 15:00more people left in the sixties. I don’t think many people left in the fifties because the farming industry, you know, in the fifties people didn’t need much money to live on, what they lived on was what they grew, what they produced, they needed very little money. But I think mostly people like in the sixties went to Detroit was a big place. An influx of Eastern Kentucky people into Detroit into during the sixties and even early seventies they said was just astronomical. I have friends that moved to Detroit and, by the way, their back to Kentucky now, but yeah.

AC: Do you think that when people were leaving then that the community somehow changed?

McDONALD: You mean the communities they left from?

AC: Yeah. Mm-hmm.

McDONALD: Do you think, is the question that the community has changed?

AC: Yeah. That something happened when people left. 16:00McDONALD: To make them want to leave?

AC: No, that after these people had left if something changed within the community since there were less people.

McDONALD: Actually, there wasn’t less people. For every one that would leave, somebody would move in or somebody, you know, some other couple having children that grew up. You know, the communities are still the same. People, you know there’s, I’d say there’s probably still about the same, the amount of people.

AC: So, if someone left someone would take their place.

McDONALD: Yeah, someone would be moving into eastern Kentucky. You know, in the eighties and nineties the coal mines was [were] just going really 17:00good. And you know, people came to work in the coal mines, and you know, in the nineties there was the couple factories that opened up and then you know, you have your stores, all these things bring in business, so, actually there are more people that live there now than there were when I was growing up. A lot more.

AC: How did you or your parents keep in touch with your aunts and uncles who left?

McDONALD: If they did, I guess it would be by mail.

AC: Was there no phone. . .

McDONALD: I remember when there was no phone service up the hollow where we lived. No phones. It was mouth.

AC: How did it finally, when did it finally get phones? Do you remember?

McDONALD: Probably about thirty years ago.

AC: So, the seventies. 18:00McDONALD: No, it was before that. Probably the late to mid-sixties. Early to mid-sixties.

AC: Do you remember your parents ever having any sort of opinions of your aunts and uncles who were leaving? Like. . .

McDONALD: You mean why they left?

AC: Yeah, why they left or what they thought of them, yeah. . .

McDONALD: about leaving? No. I don’t.

AC: So did they. . .

McDONALD: Well, I have an uncle who joined the air force so that was his reason for leaving. My father’s brother was in the air force, and he retired from the air force, so he was always gone. And that was his reason for leaving and 19:00my father’s other brother, he went away for a while, but I don’t think he was gone for very many years. Probably five or six years and then he was back. He went up north somewhere to work maybe. Detroit probably. Wasn’t gone very long.

AC: So, do you think a lot of people come back?

McDONALD: Oh yes. I think more of them come back after they retire, or they move away, and they don’t like it and they come back than want to stay away.

AC: Did you feel when you moved to Frankfort that life was really different?

McDONALD: No, because I had been away quite a bit. 20:00I had always been away from home all the time.

AC: How often do you go back?

McDONALD: Home? About every other weekend. A couple weeks.

AC: Do you still keep in touch with everybody?

McDONALD: Oh yes. And I was just, just home.

AC: Why didn’t you ever return there to live permanently?

McDONALD: ’Cause my husband doesn’t like it [laughter]. But your next question would probably be, would I move back? Tomorrow. Yes, I would, I would go tomorrow.

AC: Where is your husband from?

McDONALD: Carlisle. Nicholas County.

AC: I know you told me that before, I just wanted 21:00to get it. Did you feel like school was affected by the large amounts of people who were leaving? Like the schooling system?

McDONALD: You mean was it smaller?

AC: Yeah, or did it, yeah, was it smaller?

McDONALD: Actually, you know, there’s only one county high school, Breathitt County High School, and so every kid in the county went to school there so no, it wasn’t small. And you know there’s elementary schools spread out throughout the county, and which there still is to this day, but there’s still only one county school and one independent city school so no, actually I think, Pat, my brother’s wife, 22:00she works in the county, Breathitt County school, she works with special ed. students. I think she was telling me the other day they had either 1,800 or 2,000 students. I think she was just telling me that the other day. That’s this year. So no, it’s not that small.

AC: How, how old were most of the people who left when they left? Like was there a certain age group that left?

McDONALD: You know, I don’t know. I would say that they married and left. Probably in their twenties and thirties.

AC: 23:00What sorts of jobs has your family who is still there had?

McDONALD: You mean, where do they work now?

AC: Yeah, where do they work now? Or where did they work?

McDONALD: Actually, none of my sister’s work.

AC: O.k. What about their husbands?

McDONALD: Well, my oldest sisters husband runs a sawmill. You know what a sawmill is. And my sister Myrtle next to her, hers has been retired from the coal mines, and you know what my husband does, and my sister next to me, her husband’s dead. He passed away a few years ago, Nettie Fay. And the one next to her Lillian, she lives up in Ohio, her husband retired from the CSX railroad, you know what that is, and the one next to her, Bess, her husband retired from the coal mines, let me keep them straight. Let’s see, and the next one, her husband retired from the coal mines 24:00and Josephine, you know her, she lives up there, her husband works for Hinkle construction and my brother Irvin, he works at a Wal-Mart, and Carl, my baby brother, he’s--builds houses.

AC: Have they had those jobs for a long time? For ( ) jobs?

McDONALD: Mm-hmm.

AC: What would you say are the most popular occupations in Jackson, like what do most people do? 25:00McDONALD: Now?

AC: Mm-hmm, now.

McDONALD: You mean, where do most people work? The hospital. That’s the biggest employer.

AC: Is that a new hospital there?

McDONALD: It’s been there probably twenty years I’d guess.

AC: What do you think most people’s occupation was like in the sixties?

McDONALD: Coal mines.

AC: Coal mines. Were there coal mines in Breathitt County? 26:00McDONALD: There’s strip mines. There’s no deep mines, you know, it’s all surface mining. Do you know the difference?

AC: No.

McDONALD: Strip mines is when they cut them to the top, they go to the top of the mountain, they just lay the mountain back and take the coal out and there’s a big gaping hole there. And deep mining is where they go down to the bottom and go under the mountain and take the coal out and leave a gaping hole. But when they strip the property, you know, the person’s property, they have to reclaim the property, meaning that the coal company has to go back in there and leave the property better than when they stripped it, before they stripped it, you know, or like as well as, you know. There’s a lot of vacant strip mines in Breathitt County. Sometime[s] we’ll walk to one.

AC: Okay.

McDONALD: You have to take a four wheel, like this on top of the mountain. Been a couple of years since I’ve been up one though. But you can, they’re accessible. 27:00AC: Do people do that at all anymore?

McDONALD: You mean strip mine?

AC: Yeah.

McDONALD: Oh yeah, they’re, they’re mining, or they was, I don’t know if they still are, right outside of Robinson Forest, you know University of Kentucky owns Robinson Forest and it was a big deal until not too long ago whether they should cut the lumber around Robinson Forest and I think, if I’m not mistaken that the University sold some property to be stripped right outside of Robinson Forest. That’s a big area of Breathitt County.

END OF TAPE ONE, SIDE A BEGINNING OF TAPE ONE, SIDE B McDONALD: U.K. owns it for research or whatever.

AC: Mm-hmm. But sort of, do you think there are things that have mostly stayed the same 28:00since you left, or do you think things have changed for the most part?

McDONALD: What things?

AC: Community, which hasn’t ‘cause you said it hasn’t really. What about like economically?

McDONALD: Economically I think it’s worse off now than it was probably twenty years ago because there’s not a lot of work. Stores are closing up, the only store I can think of is Wal-Mart and there’s a little clothing store called Rose’s, Rose Brothers, or something like that. It’s probably worse.

AC: Do you think that’s 29:00going to cause, what do you think that’s going to make people do to make a living?

McDONALD: They draw out welfare. Well, it’s just, it’s called something else now, it’s called, was--is it called? SSI? You need to go to back issues of the Herald Leader, the Lexington paper, did a series of articles about a year ago on eastern Kentucky and the poverty levels there and I think there’s like, maybe seven out of ten people was getting a check, a government check. Go to the archives and pull the Lexington Herald Leaders up, 30:00the Lexington Herald Leader and read the ( ). It was a Sunday; it was the Sunday paper. And they, you know, did it for two or three consecutive Sundays, I believe. And the statistics were just. It was awesome. I wasn’t aware of it.

AC: Do you feel like, since you grew up there, that’s why you weren’t aware of it? ‘Cause it doesn’t seem that way when you’re there? Or how do you, how did you feel when you were growing up? Did you feel. . .

McDONALD: Oh, well, when I was growing up there was no such thing as welfare.

AC: Okay. [laughing] So you feel as if things were better there when you were growing up than they are now?

McDONALD: Yes. Yes. I think we had, you know, I had, we had a farm, you know, we had family, we had just, 31:00there’s just, there are no jobs, you know. When I was there, growing up, kids don’t think about those things. It probably was there; we just didn’t know about it. When you’re growing up you don’t know about things like that.

AC: Right. Do you feel like back then there was more sustainable, people doing more sustainable agriculture, like, where they did it just for their families?

McDONALD: Oh, they did it for their families. They’d never sell anything. There was never anything left to sell. You grew your corn, your vegetables, you had your meat, you know, you didn’t sell any of this because you had your family to feed. And my father worked also. 32:00He had a job.

AC: What about now?

McDONALD: What about it?

AC: Do people do that anymore now?

McDONALD: You mean farm?

AC: Yeah. In eastern Kentucky?

McDONALD: No. They raise gardens a little, you know, vegetable gardens. No, there’s no farm. Tobacco. But there’s no money in it. You know, the price cuts.

AC: Why do you think people stopped?

McDONALD: There’s no money in it. Tobacco doesn’t bring very much pound any more.

AC: Why do you think people stopped growing their own food for their families?

McDONALD: ‘Cause they could buy it cheaper. Go to the grocery store and buy it cheaper. Well, there’s still, a lot of them still grow, you know can, a lot of them still can, grow their own vegetables and can. Some of them, a few of them still raise their own hogs, you know. 33:00You’re talking about way back in the mountains.

AC: Are there any areas like that in Breathitt County? Where people do that?

McDONALD: Maybe south fork. Some in Neon.

AC: When you say south fork, does that mean south fork of the Kentucky River?

McDONALD: Yes.

AC: Okay.

McDONALD: Well, no, actually, actually no it’s a little community. I know where you’re talking about. South fork is off of state highway fifteen between Breathitt County, between Jackson and Hazard.

AC: Oh, okay.

McDONALD: It’s a road, south fork.

AC: Oh, okay.

McDONALD: But I know what you’re talking about, the south fork of the Kentucky River, but no, it’s not that.

AC: Okay. Well, 34:00that’s enough. You want me to ask you more? I just don’t want to wear you out.

McDONALD: Oh, you’re not wearing me out.

AC: Okay. I know you probably have a lot on your mind.

McDONALD: Oh no, I’m just thinking about my sister.

AC: I know.

McDONALD: But I’m sure she’ll be okay. You go ahead, I’m sure she’ll be okay.

AC: Okay. Do you think that when people left to get jobs other places like you said, Detroit and. . .

McDONALD: Cleveland, Dayton, those are all popular cities.

AC: Do you think what happened to them in these new places effected back home? Like whether they returned and if they did, ( )?

McDONALD: Effected 35:00it how?

AC: I don’t know. Just any sort of changes occur after they had lived in a more urban area?

McDONALD: Actually, I think I know what you’re talking about and I think their situation after they moved into the cities was worse than it was in the country before they left because I have, you know, I have friends like I told you that went to Detroit and then, you know, to work and the way they lived, you know, like, all of the whole family jammed into a--a one and two room apartment which, to me is worse than what they left in Eastern Kentucky. You know, they may have had a job, but the living conditions, some of them were pretty bad. ‘Cause you take a husband and wife and four or five, maybe six kids, and jam them into like a two room apartment next to the railroad tracks somewhere in the city, you know, that situation to me is going from bad to worse. I’ve known people that were in those situations. 36:00AC: Do you think the majority of people who left were in those situations?

McDONALD: Are you asking, did most of them end up that way?

AC: Mm-hmm.

McDONALD: No, not most of them, but some of them. No, I have a friend that I went to school with, moved to Florida, Miami, and he just, he retired from, I think it was maybe G.E. or Westinghouse, after thirty years. He was a manager, worked himself up to a manager and now he’s back in Breathitt County after, I think he was gone for thirty years. So, no, not all of them. A lot of them. And I went to school with this other person that, he was in Chicago where he worked in a factory for thirty years and he’s just happy to be back in Breathitt County. 37:00AC: Why do you think people feel that way?

McDONALD: It’s home. There’s family, you know, big extended family, they still have family in eastern Kentucky. That’s what I think, it is. Being home, they feel like they’re coming home.

AC: Is there something distinctive about eastern Kentucky that isn’t about any place where anybody grows up?

McDONALD: Family.

AC: How is family different there?

McDONALD: Closer, I think it’s closer. I think people that are, you know born and raised and grew up in Eastern Kentucky, I think you’re closer to your family because family is a big thing, you know, it’s important. You know, I think they call it roots. It’s more important than it is anywhere else. 38:00AC: Do you think there’s anything distinctive about Jackson regarding people leaving during that time period?

McDONALD: You mean something that made them leave?

AC: No, yeah. Something distinctive that made them leave? Or something that didn’t make them leave that made people like in other counties leave?

McDONALD: No, I can’t think of anything.

AC: Okay. Do you know what sort of organizations have come in and tried to help in Breathitt County?

McDONALD: Well, I know there’s Catholic services. That’s in Perry County, I don’t know 39:00of any in Breathitt County.

AC: None in Breathitt County?

McDONALD: No, I don’t think so, I don’t believe so. There might be, I just don’t know.

AC: My mom told me about missionaries.

McDONALD: Oh, the missionaries. That’s church. Its church related. We always had missionaries in the area, but they came from Philadelphia I believe. But there isn’t any, I don’t think there’re any there now. There’s a minister at the church. You know, the church at the tiny little house, but there’s not missionaries anymore. Now they send missionaries from the church, from our church, they send, we, they have missionaries that they support in other places, the church does, but I don’t know of any missionaries. I’m sure there are some there, but I don’t know where.

AC: When 40:00were they there?

McDONALD: Probably in the late thirties and early forties. Maybe into, probably up to ‘55.

AC: Were they there mostly to, mostly for religious purposes?

McDONALD: Mm-hmm. They had bible camps in the summer, they had Sunday school and church, you know, church. We had a minister that would come in from another church.

AC: How did people receive them?

McDONALD: Very well. They were really a part of the community.

AC: 41:00Can you think of a time where there was a big influx of people coming back?

McDONALD: Back to eastern Kentucky?

AC: Yeah.

McDONALD: In the last five years. People my age when they’re retiring. And they’re moving back. Yeah, in the last five years.

AC: And they’re mostly returning back because of its home?

McDONALD: Yes. And they, where they went to, they’re retiring, now they’re ready to come home.

AC: Do you think that’s going to change the region in any way?

McDONALD: These people coming back?

AC: Mm-hmm.

McDONALD: No. 42:00AC: What do you think, do you think people are still leaving that area?

McDONALD: To go to school, but they’re going back. You know, they’re, they go away and they go to college, then they go back. I have a nephew who will probably be going back next year. He’s a doctor. You know my sister Bess? I don’t know if I told you, her son’s a doctor. And I think he’s going to go back and practice medicine. He’s a surgeon. He’s taking, he was a sports medicine. He did his residence and everything in sports medicine and then he decided he didn’t want to operate on tennis elbows, 43:00and you know, basketball knees and that type of thing. So, he has gone back to school. He’s in Wisconsin studying cancers in children and there’s a, there’s a demand for that type of thing in eastern Kentucky. And he has two children of his own now, so I guess it’s more important to him, you know, now that he has children. Yeah.

AC: How do you think, like, 44:00you said you read about the extreme poverty rate in eastern Kentucky. How do you think that could be changed?

McDONALD: Jobs.

AC: Any particular sort of jobs?

McDONALD: Industry, anything in industry.

AC: Do you feel like when people leave that there’s any sort of tradition lost?

McDONALD: No.

AC: 45:00Can you, I don’t know if you can, can you tell me any sort of story that always sticks out in your mind of growing up there? Something funny that happened to you or your sisters or brothers.

McDONALD: I can remember getting a spanking once.

AC: Oh yeah?

McDONALD: From my grandfather. Yeah. That’s the only spanking I can remember getting though.

AC: What’d you get it for?

McDONALD: For sneaking off, for slipping off, you know. Yeah. Running away from home is what they’d call it now. Even though I was only gone ten minutes. 46:00It’s the only thing I can remember that comes to mind anyway.

AC: What sorts of things did you do to entertain yourselves when you were young?

McDONALD: We played constantly, all the time, you know with each other. We were in the creeks, we were you know, swimming in the swimming holes, we just played. Always cousins, you know we had a lot of kids. There was a lot of us! And we had cousins next door. We had them neighbors’ kids below us, we had cousins all around us though. You know there’s one time, probably fifty kids on that hollow so we just played from the time we got up until dark, you know we had to be driven in the house.

AC: How many kids do you think live on that hollow now?

McDONALD: Now? Well, I can count them. I think there’s five maybe. 47:00AC: Do they play like you guys did?

McDONALD: No, they don’t even, they don’t even get out, you know, they don’t get out of there, you know, where they live. You know, one of them’ s my little great nice and they don’t, she’s, she’ll be four, you know, she’s not old enough to play and the other children up the hollow, I think some of those are just babies even, younger than even she is. I think there’s one little boy. He’s probably five. There’s no children there anymore.

AC: Did the greater number of your siblings stay there?

McDONALD: All of them except myself and one of my sisters.

AC: Which sister was left?

McDONALD: Lillian.

AC: Oh, okay.

McDONALD: And she’s up in Tiffin, Tiffin, Ohio for, I think she’s been there thirty or forty years. 48:00Her daughter Jennifer is manager of the Westinghouse Corporation in Findlay, Ohio. She’ an industrial engineer like my ( ). And she and her husband are moving back to Breathitt County, I think.

AC: Oh really?

McDONALD: Yeah, they’re supposed to come look at a house in the next couple weeks.

AC: So did they leave for. . .

McDONALD: She left, she met her husband in Ohio and they’re moving down here or going to think about it. And that’d be nice.

AC: How old was she when she left?

McDONALD: Seventeen. Sixteen, seventeen.

AC: But did, did you say what she did when she first left?

McDONALD: She went there because, I had a relative there, but I don’t remember who she went to stay with, 49:00live with, I don’t remember. Some of my mother’s people.

AC: Mm-hmm. Are most of, so, most of the family members that stayed there, they all grew up on that hollow? What do you call that hollow? Do you call it anything?

McDONALD: Yeah, it’s got a name. Frozen.

AC: Frozen? Oh yeah. My mom told me.

McDONALD: Frozen Creek. Why did they call it Frozen? I have no idea. Really, I have no idea.

AC: But only Josephine and Irvin are on that?

McDONALD: Mm-hmm.

AC: But all the rest are 50:00in the . . .

McDONALD: In the area.

AC: Okay. How, how did they meet their husbands?

McDONALD: They grew up with them.

AC: Okay. [laughter] So everyone’s from around there, nobody came in from anywhere else.

McDONALD: Afraid not.

AC: Okay, that’s it.

McDONALD: You can’t think of anything else you want to know?

AC: [laughing] Not yet. Is there anything else you’d like to tell me?

McDONALD: No, you’ve covered it pretty well. I can’t think of anything.

AC: It’s interesting to me how, like, 51:00I read about all these people leaving but then I, it’s never mentioned how many people come back into the area.

McDONALD: Yeah, well you know, you don’t hear about that.

AC: Mm-hmm. And from what I read I would think that the area drastically changed because people left but. . .

McDONALD: How would you think it changed?

AC: I would feel like since people of the working age, like thirty and forty left that the people left behind would be older people so it would sort of deteriorate the community.

McDONALD: You know, I think most people that are, that think about that think that way, but when you think about it today, the people in Breathitt County I think are, there are more 52:00younger people than there are elderly people. I don’t know why though, you can probably look that up what the ratio is, but I would think there are more people like, working age than there are elderly, elderly people because I don’t know too many people in their seventies at all. I don’t even know, my oldest sister is sixty-two, I don’t know anybody older than her. I’m sure there are, there are a lot of people in Breathitt County that’s older, but I would think they’re more working type people, you know, under sixty-two than there are over sixty-two.

END OF TAPE ONE, SIDE B BEGINNING OF TAPE TWO, SIDE A MCDONALD: …and you know, that’s something I’ve never thought about. 53:00But I know a lot of people now are, you know, after they, graduate from high school they go to Moorehead, MSU or come to UK and get degrees and then they go back. And you know, there’s all kinds of scholarship money out there, all kinds of loans and grants for people from eastern Kentucky now. My daughter has a friend who’s going to law school, you know, where she works and she’s from eastern Kentucky and she has her house you know, a really nice home and goes back every weekend. Now she’s in law school, when she gets her law degree she’ll go back. She already has a firm. Her sister is an attorney, I already, you know, she already has a job when she gets out of law school so. . . There’s a lot of professional people out in Breathitt County. And the town closes up on Wednesday, 54:00you know, the attorney’s office, all the offices, isn’t that funny? And you know, just some of the stores close, the banks close because these are independent people, you know, they can afford to be independent because that’s your industry, you know, they work in the hospital, or they are attorneys or doctors, and you know women work in the doctor’s offices, or they work at the hospital. You know, it’s kind of laid back, a little community. It’s gotten better over the years.

AC: And do you think, ‘cause you know, right now all over, like the United States it’s really hard to find a job, I mean do you think that’s why it is in Breathitt, just because it’s 55:00like that everywhere or do you think there’s something particular?

MCDONALD: Well, there’s not a lot of jobs in Breathitt County. Like I told you, there’s a lot in the service industries, you know, like restaurants, and hospitals, nursing home, there’s a nursing home, Walmart, but as far as industry, there is no industry, but I’m sure there’s a job out there for everybody who’s wanting to find a job. Some kind of a job. But it’s you know, hard to find a job anywhere anymore. I was in manufacturing for 20 years and lost my job. So, it’s not, it’s that way all over, like you said, it’s that way all over, not just in eastern Kentucky. I think it’s a little worse because there is no industry, there’s no jobs, to be had, now there are people who live in Breathitt County and drive to Lexington and work. So, there are people who live in Perry County and drive to Fayette County. That’s hard to believe. But there’s a job for anybody who wants to work. 56:00AC: I wonder, I wish, I’m sure somewhere there’s some sort of book that says, maybe the percentage of people who left who stayed gone and I’d like to know the percentage of people who come back and see if. . .

MCDONALD: I don’t know what you could. . . Maybe you can go online and find something like that out, or the library at UK. I bet you that’s where you could find all that information.

AC: I mean, I’m sure I could find it at the historical society, I just never thought to look about that because when I hear about people leaving, I mean, the out-migration, I think they’re gone, you know. . .

MCDONALD: Oh, you just thought they packed up their pick-up trucks [LAUGHTER] put that rocking chair there and sit granny in it and move on. 57:00AC: Not exactly like that but. . .

MCDONALD: You know, I think the Beverly Hillbillies did more for the down spiral of eastern Kentucky than anything in the history of Kentucky. When anybody hears the term ‘eastern Kentucky’ I think that’s the first thing they think of. Actually, eastern Kentucky is not like that at all. There is no oil. Unless it’s in somebody’s creek or somebody’s well, you know there is no oil! And that’s sad because that’s not eastern Kentucky at all with the shot gun. Well, maybe it was back during prohibition, but it’s not that anymore if it ever was.

AC: All I knew of it was what my mom told me.

MCDONALD: Well, she knew very little because she, her, Aunt Grace and Uncle Everett left I think 58:00maybe when your mother was about your age now, no, your mother wasn’t that old, I’m talking about when Grace was your, when your Granny was about the age you are now. Is that what your mother told you?

AC: Yeah. She tells me, you know she tells me stories about them all the time and since they’re from eastern Kentucky, that’s sort of what I have in my mind. . .

MCDONALD: What, she told you stories that her mother told her?

AC: No, she told me stories about her mother and father, and since they’re from eastern Kentucky. . .

MCDONALD: Oh, but do you, do you not think that Aunt Grace ever told her anything about growing up?

AC: Oh, I’m sure she did, I just. . . I need to ask her about it.

MCDONALD: Might be something she you know, doesn’t 59:00want to talk about. I remember Aunt Grace real, real well. Was you close with your Granny?

AC: No, she died before I was born. I never knew her.

MCDONALD: Oh really? I didn’t know, I didn’t know she’d been dead that long! Oh, it just seems like yesterday, I can remember her. You look a lot like her. [Laughter] Does your mother tell you that?

AC: Yeah, she tells me that a lot.

MCDONALD: I can remember her just like yesterday. She always was so nice and so clean. Always wore these beautiful dresses. Always wore dresses. And heels. And sandals, white sandals. I always remember her in white sandals. And dresses. She was a beautiful woman. I didn’t realize she had been gone that long. I remember her in the summers, come back to Kentucky her and Uncle Everett. And Phyllis, I mean she was a child. Well actually, she was 60:00older than I was, but to me you know, I remember her as a child. But you know, she’s Hazel’s age. She’s four years older than I am, but to me she was always just so small! Maybe I was bigger than she was. I just always remember her as a child, that’s strange, isn’t it? I think Grace used to dress her up in these little dresses. She talk[s] about that?

AC: Yeah, she talks about how kind of, neat and organized she was.

MCDONALD: And hats, Aunt Grace used to like hats. Your mom ever tell you that?

AC: Mmm, not about hats.

MCDONALD: I remember this little dress that your Granny, Aunt Grace, sent us uh, my older sister Myrtle and me, an outfit at easter time, she didn’t, I don’t know if your mom ever knew that. 61:00But she did this for I don’t know how many years, around Easter time she’d always send Myrtle and me, this was when there was only the three of us; Hazel, Myrtle, and me, and see ‘cause Hazel lived with our grandparents, that just left Myrtle and me at home and Aunt Grace would send Myrtle and me an Easter outfit. Every year! I had forgotten about that. And she did that for many years. I wonder if your mother knew that. And she sent me this little white hat one year. One Easter, and it had little blue flowers on it. And a little white dress. I especially remember this little dress because it scratched. This is when they had slips under them. And it was a white dress and it had little blue flowers and the little hat was white and had little blue flowers on it. And she was, I don’t know where these pictures are, but she would always send these pictures of Phyllis and she would always have these hats and dresses. 62:00[Laughter] and I wonder if your mother, has she ever told you about that?

AC: She says that she always dressed her up kind of like a little doll and she curled her hair.

MCDONALD: And you know it’s strange because my daughter accuses me of the same thing. She says she didn’t have a normal childhood because I never let her wear blue jeans or tanks or anything. Because she always wore dresses and pant suits you know? Isn’t that strange? But you know, that’s true. But Aunt Grace was always so perfectly dressed. And her poor husband was just the opposite.

AC: Oh really? [LAUGHING] He was scruffy?

MCDONALD: Oh, you didn’t know him either?

AC: No, he died when I was about two years old.

MCDONALD: Well, he wasn’t scruffy, 63:00he was just the opposite of her. She was always neat and clean but he, to the best that I can remember he was just always the opposite. Strange, the things you remember. I can remember them coming to Kentucky in the summers and Phyllis wasn’t allowed to get dirty. Why am I talking like that? That’s the way I was with Lisa. Strange though. It was, she you know, she didn’t get out and play like we did.

AC: I don’t know.

MCDONALD: I don’t remember her ever getting, I remember her being on the porch. They had this long porch across the front of the house, and I can remember her sitting in the chair with her little dresses on. Even in the summertime. When we shed our shoes the first day of May, we never put them back on until school started in the fall. I can’t see Aunt Grace letting her go barefoot. 64:00AC: Do you think that was just part of her personality or was it because she had. . .MCDONALD: You mean. . .

AC: Yeah. Or was it because she lived in, she left?

MCDONALD: Well, actually I think back then the way she and her sister Aunt Rine, you know, I think the way they were raised was much better than most people in eastern Kentucky. I think they had more than the average person in eastern Kentucky. ‘Cause my grandparents, you know, they always seemed to have everything they wanted so I don’t think that was it at all. You know, they had a nice house, they grew up in, in that area, in that era was considered a nice house. And you know, they always had clothes and everything. What at that time would have been considered nice clothes. So, I don’t think that would have been the reason for her being overly protective 65:00and all that.

AC: Maybe it was because my mom was an only child.

MCDONALD: I think that’s it. I know with my daughter everything’s in excess. Everything, you know, absolutely everything. And with myself, you know, I don’t, I’m always, I can’t just have one of anything, I’ve got to have five or ten or whatever. No, with me it’s probably that way. I don’t just have one purse; I probably have ten. I don’t just have one pair of shoes; I probably have 100. You know, I think with me now that’s the reason. ‘Cause I did go without a whole lot of things.

AC: Were Grace and your father close in age?

MCDONALD: Well, let’s see. I think 66:00daddy is the second. I think Aunt Grace is next to daddy. Lorrine was the baby.

AC: Do you remember what year your dad was born?

MCDONALD: 1909. September the third.

AC: And he grew up with my grandma’s house with my great-grandparents?

MCDONALD: Yeah. Have you seen pictures of them?

AC: Yeah. Mmm hmm. My mom tells me a lot that I look like my great-grandmother.

MCDONALD: She was kind of short, he was big. She was short, real dark skinned, dark hair about the color of yours. About the same eye color. Brown eyes. Brownish. Real dark eyes.

AC: So, 67:00your dad just stayed on that hallow his whole life?

MCDONALD: Mmm-hmm. He’s been dead, what 1979?

AC: That’s about when my grandma died.

MCDONALD: Yeah, she died right after daddy died.

AC: And then I was born just a little bit later. Do you think the way he was brought up was a lot different from the way you were brought up? Like, I don’t know. [Laughing] Do you think. . .

MCDONALD: I think my grandfather was too strict with his children.

AC: Oh, okay.

MCDONALD: I don’t know why I think that, because you know, by the time I was born they were all married and had 68:00families of their own, for some reason I believe he was too, so strict with his children. I think he; he maybe whipped them, you know back in those days I don’t know if they did, but I always thought that. I never believe he did to Aunt Rine, you know, the youngest one, but I think he might have daddy and maybe Aunt Grace. Yeah, I don’t know why I think that, but I always, always have. You’re talking the late 1800’s.

AC: Do you think. . . So, was he there to watch? My grandma and Rine, Riney. . .

MCDONALD: Aunt Lorrine?

AC: Yeah. And. . .well, they both left, so was he there to see them leave? 69:00He was.

MCDONALD: They got married. Uncle Everett’s from eastern Kentucky. Your grandfather’s from eastern Kentucky. Your granny married him in eastern Kentucky, and they lived in eastern Kentucky for a little while, I don’t know how long, with her, your granny’s parents. I don’t know any of the conditions under which they left. I never heard anybody talk about it, but I can remember hearing mom and dad talk about how upset he was when Aunt Rine left. I can remember that. I think there was some kind of thing that when she left, she didn’t return home for many years. I can just barely remember them talking about that. I don’t know the details though.

AC: Did she get married and leave?

MCDONALD: Mmm-hmm. [pause] No, I take that back, I believe she did. I don’t, 70:00I think she left when she was single, but I don’t know where she went. I know her husband wasn’t from eastern Kentucky. But I don’t know where he was from. . .

AC: I’m trying to think. . . Her, um, have you, do you ever see her?

MCDONALD: [Indicates she doesn’t] AC: Oh, okay. I can’t remember how she was last time I saw her.

MCDONALD: She has Alzheimer’s.

AC: Oh, she does?

MCDONALD: I don’t even think she knows Sharon.

AC: Oh, okay. Sharon’s my mom’s age? About?

MCDONALD: No, Sharon’s my age. Sharon and I are the same age. And your mom and my sister Hazel are the same age. 71:00AC: Well maybe, maybe Sharon would be interesting to interview because maybe she’d be able to tell me some things about. . .

MCDONALD: She might. I wonder, I wonder what, oh, now she spent summers. . .

AC: Sharon did?

MCDONALD: That’s what Hazel was telling me the other day. I don’t remember her spending summers there, but Hazel said she did. She said that Aunt ‘Rine would come there with her and spend summers. I don’t remember it. But she probably would.

AC: How often would my mom come visit when she. . .

MCDONALD: In the summers. I don’t, you know, I just remember her being there sometime in the summers. You know, it could have been every summer, it could have been every five summers, you know, when you’re a child seems like the summers last forever.

AC: Yeah.

MCDONALD: So, I don’t remember how. . .

AC: So, what my mom tells me is that, 72:00you know, she was born in your grandparents’ house and that they moved around a little while, I guess they lived in mining camps for a little while, different ones. . .

MCDONALD: You know, I don’t remember them, you know, I don’t remember hearing anybody talk about that.

AC: I feel like she just recently told me that because it was something I never knew and then they went, they lived in. . .

MCDONALD: They lived on a dairy farm once.

AC: Yeah. I think they lived in Eaton, Ohio at first just for a little bit and then they lived in Versailles, Indiana.

MCDONALD: That’s where I remember them living biggest part of the time.

AC: Then they lived there for the most part until ( ) and then they lived in Oxford a little bit right before my grandma died so they could be near my mom.

MCDONALD: Well, your granny 73:00lived on a farm, didn’t she? Aunt Grace? She lived more or less out in the country.

AC: Yeah, in Indiana, mm-hmm. Yeah.

MCDONALD: I think they did cows or something.

AC: Yeah, they farmed. You think a lot of people were like them? They left and they farmed? You think they went places to farm?

MCDONALD: No, I don’t believe so. I don’t know how Uncle Everett lucked into farming. But I, most people that lived in eastern Kentucky left to work in the steel mills up north. In Detroit, Cleveland, Columbus, Dayton. You’ve been to Dayton?

AC: Mm-hmm.

MCDONALD: I don’t like Dayton. [laughter] It’s dirty. You’ve been to Florida? Dayton reminds me of Jacksonville.

AC: Oh yeah? I’ve never been to Jacksonville.

MCDONALD: Oh, it’s dirty. It’s real filthy. Smokestacks. 74:00Smells bad.

AC: I should try to get in touch with Sharon.

MCDONALD: I would if I were you.

AC: Do you know where she lives?

MCDONALD: She lives in Dayton.

AC: She lives in Dayton too. Okay.

MCDONALD: I can’t believe you haven’t seen Aunt Rene.

AC: I have seen her; I just haven’t seen her that often.

MCDONALD: I haven’t seen her in years.

AC: And I see my mom’s family on her dad’s side a lot.

MCDONALD: I was going to ask you about that. Do they live real close to you all?

AC: Yeah, they live, most of them actually live in Indiana and then some of them live in Dayton. There’s a lot of my grandfathers. . . he had a bunch of sisters and brother 75:00and I think most of them are from Indiana, but I think there’s one Aunt also in Dayton from my mom’s. . .

MCDONALD: Ever been to the Amish in Indiana? There’s a lot of them there, isn’t there? I would love to go there. Lisa and I went to Brown County, Indiana where that Artist Colony.

AC: Yeah.

MCDONALD: You been there?

AC: Mm-hmm.

MCDONALD: We went up there about seven months ago. And it’s nice. There’s a winery but they roll the streets up at five o’clock in the afternoon. Everything shuts down. I have friends that went, or still do go up there shopping in the Amish villages in Indiana every year. I would like to go to that. Do they make a lot of, you said you don’t know if they have a lot of stores and stuff.

AC: I don’t know.

MCDONALD: Well, 76:00which part of Indiana is that?

AC: The Amish part?

MCDONALD: Central?

AC: Yeah, I think it’s more north central, I think. I’m not positive. I know that, well, I feel like that in Ohio the Amish. . .

MCDONALD: Are there Amish in Ohio?

AC: I feel like they’re in the more northern part of the state, but I’m not positive. Because I know like, schools have gone on field trips to Amish country but. . . I don’t know.

MCDONALD: Well, I guess the Ohio Amish would be closer than the Indiana Amish, wouldn’t it? To Lexington?

AC: It depends how north they are. I don’t know. I can try to find out. 77:00I have lots of friends in Indiana who would probably know more about this than I would. Well, I guess we can stop [laughing] I don’t want to wear you completely out.

MCDONALD: Oh, that’s okay.

END OF INTERVIEW