Transcript of Oral History Tape #52 Transcribed by Tina Kraemer 8/18/03.

Interview with Mrs. Hill - November 8, 1977

Interviewer: You talked about your school.

Mrs. Hill: Yeah. I went to a country school. I don't think I started school until I was 7. They didn't start early then, of course they didn't have kindergarten and there was every grade in the school. Usually I had a man teacher. My first teacher though was a woman and there were 25 to 35 in the school. They came, they rode horses and they drove horses and their folks brought them to school and came after them. They didn't have any buses those days and a lot of them walked of course, maybe several miles. And they . . . [indecipherable] . . . we had a lot of fun at school and we had recess at 10:00 and they played ball. Well I wasn't any good because I was too little, but they let me play as a fielder so everybody could play.

Interviewer: Was it softball you were playing?

Mrs. Hill: Oh, I suppose I don't know. We had bats made out of pieces of fence, it was about that wide and we played "pump-pump-pullaway."

Interviewer: How do you play "pump-pump-pull away?"

Mrs. Hill: I don't remember now and what was that, we threw the ball over the school house. I remember we had quite a large, old fashioned brick school and then there was a tool shed and I remember I guess we were so enamored with school that in the recess it was raining we went in the shed and played school .

Interviewer: [indecipherable]

Mrs. Hill: Oh we had some awfully poor teachers, and we had some awfully good ones. They didn't do very much outside of reading, writing, 'rithmetic which was a good thing because we did learn to spell and we got out of 'rithmetic early. If you don't get that you're lost you know the rest of your life . . . [indecipherable]. And then oh we'd have picnics and we'd have socials. That was lots of fun. The girls would fix boxes of food you know, decorate them and the boys and it didn't matter how old you were, some old men they'd be buying the little girl's box they didn't know and paid $2 or $3 for it you know and that went to buy things for the school that we needed.

Interviewer: These kind of socials, how often would you have them?

Mrs. Hill: Probably once a year. It was a big thing.

Interviewer: When was it usually held?

Mrs. Hill: In the school.

Interviewer: I mean what season . . . spring or fall?

Mrs. Hill: I just don't remember now, but I know that they'd always have fried chicken and or real meals you know in the lunch box and they'd have a program, musical pieces. And of course at Christmastime we'd have a big time, usually a Christmas tree and folks would come. Those days it was the thing for the parents to visit school quite often and you never knew when they were coming, they'd just walk in and surprise you. I don't remember my father ever coming, but my mother did. Of course we didn't have any PTAs those days, but then I suppose the parents were just as much interested as they are nowadays. And they didn't have all that, I call it foolishness then now because we were there to study, but I don't remember ever taking a book home. I don't think we had homework. They didn't push us. And then we'd have picnics in the summer and I always wanted a new dress for that picnic. That was a big day. We'd go down to a road about a half mile away and the men would put big swings you know up in the trees and we'd swing, play "drop the handkerchief "and all those little games.

Interviewer: Do you remember how to play that?

Mrs. Hill: We'd get in a big ring and then somebody would go around and drop the handkerchief behind somebody. When they found it they had to chase em around and get it and if they caught em then they got to drop it, something like that. You don't see that anymore.

Interviewer: You grew up out in Pinhook?

Mrs. Hill: That's right. There was about 8 houses there.

Interviewer: Where was the school located?

Mrs. Hill: Right back of our house. I had to just go through the orchard, quite a large orchard, and then there was the school. And of course I lived so close that I never took a lunch, but I'd tease my mother once in awhile to let me take a lunch so she'd pack me a lunch and I'd eat at school. Of course the rainy days we didn't get out and play and the days were kind of long. The teacher those days had to get there early and maybe sweep up . . . [indecipherable] and make a fire, pump some water, of course sometimes some of the big boys would get there and they were big boys, they were great big boys. You know on a farm I guess they grow em bigger and they would start to help the teacher bring in a pail of water. It was the cup, you know the dipper. They all drank out of the same [indecipherable]. I don't remember ever getting sick or had colds. Nowadays you'd think that was just impossible.

Interviewer: Can you tell me what the school building looked like?

Mrs. Hill: Oh yes. It was a big . . . [indecipherable] well this was a shed [indecipherable]. It was a big plain brick, it was quite high, quite large [indecipherable].

Interviewer: What did it look like inside? When you walked in the front doors what did you see there?

Mrs. Hill: Well, after you got through this little entryway there were seats and they weren't separate seats, they were long . . . two . . . two sat in the middle and then we always hated it if we got one of the boys to sit there we didn't like even when we were little. Then there was a [indecipherable] a little higher up in front and the teacher's desk was up there and in back of her was a blackboard clear across the room. And I remember they always hung for Christmas there was to draw well would put a picture up there on the fireplace of Santa Claus on that blackboard and color and it was always exciting when somebody new moved in the neighborhood, then we'd find out all about em. One little girl her folks brought her several miles to school and she was so neat, I remember to this day she was such a clean child and she had such pretty little gingham dresses. We usually had two dresses I remember and two calico dresses that I wore one one day and the other one the next. Then in the winter, of course, we wore heavy wool dresses because our school was cold and we sat right near the big stove.

Interviewer: It was heat from the wood stove?

Mrs. Hill: Yeah and the big boys [indecipherable] and then the teacher usually drove a horse and there was a place for it the horse in the shed, the boys would take care of that. We didn't have very much in the way of extras you know. Now they have everything I guess, but we had to supply our own stuff. The teacher was [indecipherable] generous, she would [indecipherable] and my mother at certain times boarded the teacher. They had to board [indecipherable] especially in the winter when they were going to drive too far wanted to stay here and the boys would always tease me they'd say cause she boarded at our house and I was a pet. And they'd give me a hard time always because I was the little and they'd make fun of me and pull my hair. So when I was in 7th grade my sister taught music here in Michigan City so they decided it would be better for me to come to Michigan City School and be here already for the high school. [indecipherable] when I went to the high school here I went to 7th grade over at old Garfield School [indecipherable]. I would get awfully home sick. My father usually came after me on Friday night with a horse and a buggy and that took quite awhile.

Interviewer: How long?

Mrs. Hill: 2 hours.

Interviewer: What route would he take? [indecipherable]

Mrs. Hill: Well then there wasn't any known, he went out to 421 and down to 2 but after awhile then the [indecipherable] wasn't even paved then but I don't think there was [indecipherable] then. Later after I was married and lived here they used to come in from the farm on Sundays and they always came [indecipherable] And one thing I remember doing when I was in school out there, we went to [indecipherable] President McKinley came here to Michigan City so they kept me out of school and they drove down here for that I think about sunrise and I don't remember much about it but seeing him at the station down. He on the platform with a train [indecipherable].

Interviewer: How old were you?

Mrs. Hill: I was about 10.

Interviewer: Do you remember if there was a parade?

Mrs. Hill: No there wasn't. They just stopped the train a few minutes you see and oh there were lots of people down there and I think my father held me up so I could see. I don't know. I don't think I was 10, I just don't remember. He was killed in 1901 [indecipherable] I don't know . . . before he was elected president, and I can't remember just when that was. I say we [indecipherable].

Interviewer: What kind of things did you study about, did you study about presidents or current events?

Mrs. Hill: History . . . [indecipherable] subjects [indecipherable].

Interviewer: Do you remember what an average day in your grade school was then like, like when you go there, what did they study first?

Mrs. Hill: We had to, we had a big bench that went the whole length of the school and up in front. It's kind of coming to me now and then when they would have to say only first grade reading class come up, then there were maybe 2 or 3 you know and then maybe if they got higher up maybe 6 or 7 they'd sit on that bench and then you had to do your studying in the other part of the room while that class was reciting. It was kind of hard to concentrate and then there was a lot of "tomfoolery" going on too. The teachers had to whack the kids sometimes, but I think we learned.

Interviewer: How long did school last?

Mrs. Hill: 9:00 to 4:00 [indecipherable] an hour at noon and recess at 10:00 to 10:30 and at 2:00. That wasn't too hard.

Interviewer: Did it go from September through June?

Mrs. Hill: No, it was out in April about April way back when. A lot of the boys had to quit in the spring to help their folks on the farm and they had to do chores, plowing, things like that.

Interviewer: Did you grow up on a farm too?

Mrs. Hill: Yes. I lived there until I went, came here to school then I went to business college and I worked in LaPorte and lived at home and [indecipherable] until it stopped running. Then about that time I got married and came here to live.

Interviewer: What was it like to ride on the airline?

Mrs. Hill: It was like the Tunaville Trolley but they flopped. They thought it was going to go from Chicago to New York and it was the shortest line they [decipherable]. It was the shortest, the airline, that's why they called it the airline. It was the shortest distance through the air. But it didn't last. They gave up.

Interviewer: How much did it cost to ride it to LaPorte?

Mrs. Hill: Seems to me it was 20 cents.

Interviewer: It ran from LaPorte to where?

Mrs. Hill: It ran from Chesterton over to LaPorte.

Interviewer: Where would you catch it?

Mrs. Hill: Oh about a half a mile from my house. I had to either walk up there or my father would [decipherable].

Interviewer: On Highway 2?

Mrs. Hill: Yes. [Indecipherable] crossing

Interviewer: Before you went away to school here and worked, but when you were growing up on a farm did you have a lot of farm chores?

Mrs. Hill: Oh I did whatever - picked vegetables, peas or beans, and hunt eggs. I don't think I did much.

Interviewer: What kind of farm did your family have?

Mrs. Hill: Oh they raised corn and wheat and always had a big garden. We had so much company. The relatives would come in the summer especially you know, come from other states to visit. My mother worked awfully hard. Every woman on a farm does, even now. [Indecipherable] but those days we didn't have refrigeration. We had to put things down in the basement. It was real cold down there and it kept well. But it was a lot of traveling up and down.

Interviewer: Did you have a wood stove?

Mrs. Hill: Oh yes. We had a furnace though. When I was about 4 years old my folks built a new house and they had a big furnace and they put logs in it. We had a woods and they'd go cut logs about almost 4 feet long and put it in 2 or 3 of them and it would keep all night so the house was pretty warm downstairs. It wasn't up in the bedrooms though.

Interviewer: You had no vents?

Mrs. Hill: No. We had them but we liked the cold. We liked to sleep without the heat. We still do.

Interviewer: Do you remember what kind of furniture your house had?

Mrs. Hill: Oh, barely, they had a piano. They didn't have any davenports, they had a lounge and an ordinary rocking chair. Well that was one of them.

Interviewer: Very beautiful.

Mrs. Hill: That was in the parlor. We didn't go in the parlor very much.

Interviewer: When did you go in the parlor?

Mrs. Hill: Well, my grandmother lived next door and there's was never used except for funerals. I remember when my grandfather died and in that parlor. Then at home we had company whenever we had company there were several doors they were opened then and it was all one big room. But, there was a center table. You remember they used to have a center table and ours was square in the middle of the room in the middle of the room with something on it, I don't remember what.

Interviewer: Was this in the parlor?

Mrs. Hill: Uh huh. But, of course we used the sitting room we called the living room. That was where we always sat and we had electric lights so real early in the game. We had electricity here before they did in some of the towns around I don't know how come.

Interviewer: What year about? Do you remember how old you were when electricity came through?

Mrs. Hill: I was little. I probably was about 8. Then we had a telephone too real early.

Interviewer: And you said your father had a telephone station?

Mrs. Hill: And another man had put in this rural phone from LaPorte connected in LaPorte and then of course they had like I told you before we had a little store right near our house. This other man, the storekeeper and my father were in together and they had their central in that little store and my mother and I and they had to go out the men would have to go out and do fixing on the line [indecipherable]. My mother or I or both of us would stay over there in the store and tender the switchboard and wait on the customers for his the grocery store. And it was a typical old fashioned country store with penny candy and tobacco. We had to chop off with a chopper thing and chewing tobacco [indecipherable] and anything else like kerosene or sugar and flour and all the staples. I can just smell that old place. It smelled of the kerosene that was down in the basement and they had and in the winter we had sleigh rides and what do you call them, [indecipherable] I guess and then it would seem like those days there was so much sleet and snow would be thick and deep and it was all in the trees and the regular crust and you could skate over the field you know. I never could skate, but I had a sled and we played with our sleds more than anything. Then I had a bicycle in the summer.

Interviewer: Where would you ride?

Mrs. Hill: Up and down the road. I never went very far. I had a neighbor girl that who grew up with me. She had a bicycle. We were always together, either at her house or at my house [indecipherable] and she is still living.

Interviewer: What was her name?

Mrs. Hill: Her name was Ella Maderas and she's in Detroit now and she was going to come to visit me but she can't come now. She doesn't feel like making the trip.

Interviewer: The telephone exchange that your father and his partner had, did they have to buy their exchange do you know?

Mrs. Hill: Oh yeah.

Interviewer: Did they have pay to have the poles put up and everything?

Mrs. Hill: Yes.

Interviewer: You said it ran from Pinhook to LaPorte?

Mrs. Hill: No it was from Pinhook to Westville and it connected with LaPorte. I don't know just how. I don't remember. I don't really know enough about it to know then.

Interviewer: Do you remember how many people were on the exchange?

Mrs. Hill: No, but I do remember there was about a dozen on our line. It was hectic to get in on the line and everybody listened to all your affairs. Then finally they sold out to LaPorte and now it's - I don't think they have party lines. I don't really know.

Interviewer: Do you remember your father's partner's name?

Mrs. Hill: Yes. Henry Smith.

Interviewer: I never talked to anyone who's father owned a telephone line before.

Mrs. Hill: No. They said they sold to LaPorte of course took stock for their pay in another LaPorte company.

Interviewer: Were there a lot of phones in Pinhook?

Mrs. Hill: Yes. Uh huh. All of us. All the farmers around and in Westville. Oh that was later when they got more and then they rented a building in Westville and hired a girl to run central.

Interviewer: Do you remember if people used to have to pay monthly bills like they do now for the telephone service? Is that how it worked?

Mrs. Hill: Yes, and what's more they didn't all pay so they got beat out of some money. There used to be storms and bad weather you know those wires would come down and they had another man to, younger, would climb up and fix the things.

Interviewer: Do you remember what the layout of Pinhook looked like, what the town looked like when you were growing up?

Mrs. Hill: It looks just like it does now.

Interviewer: It hasn't changed?

Mrs. Hill: No, there aren't any more houses and the old church . . . maybe you've heard about the old church.

Interviewer: The Community Church?

Mrs. Hill: They are trying to make money enough to keep it, otherwise they're going to tear it down.

Interviewer: Has it always been called the Pinhook Community Church?

Mrs. Hill: No, Methodist Church. I don't know it's just owned by the Cemetery Association now and they are trying I heard they raised $2,000 and they need more than that because they need to put a roof on it.

Interviewer: Yeah I've seen it, it's really falling apart.

Mrs. Hill: It has to be over 100 years old.

Interviewer: When the town, when you were growing up, how did you happen to prepare to settle in Pinhook?

Mrs. Hill: Well, my Grandfather Cathcart settled there. It was a long, long story. And their older brother was sent here by his father from Washington and to buy land, they called it Cathcart's retreat. It was to be a home for any of that family that delivered 12 children and 4 or 5 of them eventually came here from the east. The oldest one bought the land. They called that place Monroe about a mile from us, Cathcart's retreat, and then the other brother came there, lived there until they got settled and married and got a home of their own. So my grandfather lived and just built a few miles from there and he was surveyor and he was sent to work to Kansas to survey the land for the government for the railroad and he carried a bowie knife and that bowie knife is down at the lighthouse to keep the Indians off. So, a little boy asked me if he ever used the knife. Well he must have, he came home alive.

Interviewer: Do you know why Pinhook got the name Pinhook?

Mrs. Hill: Oh no, there are so many different stories. I don't think they ever did know.

Interviewer: When you were growing up it was called Pinhook then?

Mrs. Hill: No, it officially, that's kind of a nickname, officially the name is New Durham. Then they got to calling it Pinhook and they still do. But at one time they had a [indecipherable].

[Side one of tape ends.]

[Side two of tape begins.]

Mrs. Hill: And I remember so well one time that we never thought we never saw a man eat so much in our life. It was Christmas Day but he liked to get around he had the mail delivered for Christmas so he had Christmas dinner with us and he said "you know I'm not feeling so very well, I could have eaten more." We thought he ate an awful lot the way it was and we'd hate to have him when he was feeling good, but he was a nice man and he'd do errands and favors for us you know, bring things from LaPorte.

Interviewer: How often did you get mail?

Mrs. Hill: Every morning.

Interviewer: He came on his horse and buggy?

Mrs. Hill: He drove in on a horse and buggy, it was actually a car, and I guess they still have that same, not same man but the same idea. [indecipherable] boxes along you know he always came up to our house. Our house was off of the highway but it was the last house and he'd come up there and then he'd turn around and go back on 2. Boy, everything is so different now. More efficient in many ways and not so efficient in others. Now the transportation there just isn't any transportation out there there are no buses.

Interviewer: Can you see busses running?

Mrs. Hill: There used to be in the later years. I forgot where it went to but you could get a bus to Chicago.

Interviewer: Was it the 1930's?

Mrs. Hill: Yes, I guess it was then but not way back .

Interviewer: What businesses were in Pinhook? Were there just farms?

Mrs. Hill: No businesses at all, only little stores.

Interviewer: When did that grain elevator move in?

Mrs. Hill: Well, there's none there. It's one in Westville. Pinola, you're thinking of Pinola. That's another little town up the road on the way to LaPorte.

Interviewer: I've got them confused here.

Mrs. Hill: I don't know how it got it's name. I don't know much about that. There used to be so many railroads you know, the Lakeshore, Long Island and the Wabash, Grand Trunk, all those went to around there.

Interviewer: Did any of them stop?

Mrs. Hill: Yes, there were trains that stopped. Certain ones. [Indecipherable]

Interviewer: That you could get on from Pinhook?

Mrs. Hill: Yes, we could go to, well it's called Durham, to get on a train to go to LaPorte or Chicago, South Bend.

Interviewer: Did they do that a lot, travel?

Mrs. Hill: Yes, and then there was, oh we didn't very much no. My older sister lived in LaPorte and one from Chicago. We used to go that way to visit her and then too there was a Monon and I used that when I came here to school. My father would take me to Westville and get on the Monon, come up here on Sunday night and walk from the station up to where we lived alone. I wouldn't do it now. And then on Friday if uh I got out of school on time I'd meet a conductor on the freight train that left here about 4:00 and I would get on that and ride in the caboose to Westville. And so my father would meet me there. I remember the old man that was the agent, the ticket agent on the train, Mr. Pangburn. Everybody knew him. He kind of looked out after me. I had a couple of friends one time over the later years; two girls from here walked out from our house one Sunday. It was 12 miles and those girls were just about dead they were so tired and one of them had a dog and that dog was more tired than they were. Then of course they came back, came back on the train, I came back with them Sunday night and we didn't know what to do with that dog. We put him under the seat. It was kind of a big dog. The conductor let him ride. They didn't try that again that was too far.

Interviewer: It sounds like you run a pretty independent life for being only in what 7th grade [indecipherable].

Mrs. Hill: Yes I guess I did. They trusted me. Of course my sister was much older, both of my sisters were almost old enough to be my mother and I always felt like I was alone, an only child because my oldest sister got married and was gone and the other one went away to school, so I was kind of alone.

Interviewer: Were there many other children for you to play with besides Ella?

Mrs. Hill: No. Just this girl, one girl. I guess that's why we enjoyed school, school days and school hours so much because there were others to play with.

Interviewer: How far away did kids come to go to what was it called the New Durham School?

Mrs. Hill: Yes, and it was, oh they came at times maybe 5 miles away. Different ones. They'd start new schools and then they'd quit our school and go to their own school so there was a change all the time, children. I was just noticing here this girl she was much older than I and she lived 5 or 6 miles away, about 5 miles away, and she didn't come but only maybe 1 year because I don't know maybe she dropped out of school or maybe she went someplace else to school. It wasn't like it is now. I don't believe, I don't know whether they had laws or not, if kids had to go to school, I don't know, if they used to have laws or not. I know if you didn't when you were little you didn't get there why the truant officer would be coming around to see what was wrong. But, they never got after me because I liked school. I wasn't too keen on studying, but I liked the association with the kids.

Interviewer: What other things did the kids get together for besides school and socials?

Mrs. Hill: Well, we had birthday parties. I remember I had a birthday party, they had a surprise on me when I was 10 and I still have two little things that were given to me.

Interviewer: What were birthday parties like? What kind of things did you do?

Mrs. Hill: [Indecipherable]. I don't remember that. I remember especially the company we had in the summer. To me it's too much work, washing dishes. I always had to wash dishes.

Interviewer: How long would the company stay when they came?

Mrs. Hill: Weeks! I think the whole family'd come. There were other relatives that they would visit, so it would give us a little vacation from them once in awhile. But they were always my mother's, her sisters, our nieces, nephews and she was always so glad to see them and of course we'd go and visit them.

Interviewer: Did you ever have, when you were little, did you ever have sleepovers?

Mrs. Hill: Oh yes. Yes this girl and I, she's the only one. I'd stay with her overnight and she'd stay with me and if went on a little trip or anything she usually went with us. I remember one time we went in a trailer home through kind of a conveyance over to Flint Lake in Valparaiso, two or three families camped out, and that was the biggest time I think we ever had in our lives. She went along.

Interviewer: Would you camp out in tents?

Mrs. Hill: I don't remember. I suppose we did either that or it seems to me we slept in the back of it, it wasn't a car, it must have . . . I don't know what it was, a big conveyance of some sort. I know we got scared and I then I had something, I've forgotten what it was, but it was always exciting, we thought we had an awful good time. But those days little things meant so much and now heavens people are so used to big things, nothing phases them anymore. I think that's what's wrong with so many children, they have too much when they're young, they don't know how to handle it when they get grown up.

Interviewer: When you were growing up were the parents of your friends were your parents strict?

Mrs. Hill: We didn't think anything about it. I don't know, I suppose they were, but there wasn't any problem with discipline as far as I can see. My mom day by day if we did right, I don't know, it wasn't the discipline there that you see today or lack of it. And another thing we never thought about - calories. Nothing was ever thought of. We ate what was put on our table and that was that. And none of us were fat.

Interviewer: What was the average meal? Not at holidays, but just an average?

Mrs. Hill: Meat and potatoes and vegetables, maybe a cookie, canned fruit. My mother canned a lot of fruit. Of course they did that because they usually on Saturday we'd make a pie and a cake in case then somebody would come. You know those days in the early days they didn't have [indecipherable] and maybe some family of four or five would land at 11:00 on Sunday and visit for dinner so you had to hustle around and get something together - kill a chicken. Of course then pick the vegetables and I would usually pick the beans and they were so good, it was fresh and young. And the tomatoes, cabbage and everything was so much better then I thought.

Interviewer: Would your relatives come down for holidays too?

Mrs. Hill: No, not only my sister that was married and later had a family they would come, but no the others didn't because they lived too far away and most of them out in Iowa.

Interviewer: How were homes decorated for Christmas?

Mrs. Hill: You didn't do very much. Just have a little tree. People didn't go all out those days like they do now. Just the necessities.

Interviewer: What kind of decorations would you put on the tree?

Mrs. Hill: Oh, just little things that you had, you'd make. We didn't always have a tree I don't think. They used to have a big tree over at that school.

Interviewer: You say you didn't always have a Christmas tree?

Mrs. Hill: No, I don't think we did but they did have over at the school, at the church, Sunday school, church, whatever. They had such a big tree one time and oh there was the prettiest doll and I said oh just pray and then I'd get that doll, but I didn't. They would tie things on the tree. They didn't put them in boxes. They had em not wrapped and they'd tie things on the tree and nowadays they pile them in boxes so you can't see what's there and made the decorations on the tree and on the presents.

Interviewer: When did they start putting up decorations? Now they start putting them up practically a month before Christmas. When did people start decorating their homes and the church?

Mrs. Hill: Well, I don't think they started on Christmas Day. They'd maybe get the tree the day before, get it set up. It was so different, things like that they didn't make so much of it. I think they made more just doing right and living right and enjoying life. Now these days it seems like it's a rat race.

Interviewer: Were any of the holidays especially celebrated?

Mrs. Hill: No, not even birthdays weren't always. We had now what is Memorial Day, we called it Decoration Day then. That was always a big day in our lives. We went to Westville and they had kind of a homecoming. They had a big old hall there and there was a potluck dinner and everybody from miles around would go and people that used to live around here that maybe lived in Chicago. I know there was one man that had gone that lived here as a boy would come to be a millionaire and he'd come every Decoration Day and bring his wife. I don't know if his family or not, but he'd furnish the ice cream for the whole bunch and that was a big thing. [indecipherable] by the church and I remember going to this Methodist Church there and Mrs. Clark, one of the ladies that belonged to the whatever, one of the organizations from the Civil War anyway, she'd get up there and have a flag and she'd recite the old poem "Old Glory" and I'd sit there and cry thinking about the men that were killed in the war and after that then they'd go to this hall and then there'd be dinner and then that night it seems to me they had a dance there in the big hall. Of course what I thought was a big hall, but it wasn't much bigger than this house.

Interviewer: Where was this hall?

Mrs. Hill: Right there on the main street in Westville.

Interviewer: Is it still there? No. It might still be there.

Mrs. Hill: It could be. I, it used to be three stories and I think they took off the top stories and I think maybe the first story of that same old hall is still there, but I'm not really sure. I don't have a car anymore and I don't get around.

Interviewer: What would you do in the hall then?

Mrs. Hill: Well after the dinner why I don't know if we went home or, I think they had a dance there that night.

Interviewer: Were there many dances?

Mrs. Hill: Yes there were and then they had a library in Westville I believe. We went and got books for many years. They had a little, small little building and there was a Women's Club there and they manned that library for many years so then finally they got a Carnegie Library. Now they got a really nice library [indecipherable].

Interviewer: Did you go to into Westville more than LaPorte?

Mrs. Hill: Yes, it was closer there for grocery shopping. In LaPorte we always went for oh [indecipherable] goods, [indecipherable] goods and stuff like that, of course that was the County Seat. We used to go there and pay taxes and things like that. And that's why everybody thought it was funny. I came here to school instead of going to LaPorte. My older sister went to LaPorte School, but at that time she was teaching music here and she had a little apartment so I guess my folks thought I'd be better off here.

Interviewer: When you think about growing up in Pinhook what memory stands out the most in your mind?

Mrs. Hill: Well, I suppose my friendship with this girl. We had fun together. Going to the fair, that was a big event too in our lives. We'd save up our money and maybe get 10 or 15 cents a head and that was for merry-go-round rides. They were a nickel.

Interviewer: Where was the fair held?

Mrs. Hill: LaPorte. It still is.

Interviewer: What kind of things would you see at the fair?

Mrs. Hill: Well, just like you do now, it's the same. You see a lot of people you knew. I remember my mother wanting especially to go because she'd meet people there that she used to live around there she hadn't seen for a long time and then the horse racing. They were all interested in that and the animals and vegetables.

Interviewer: How long would you stay at the fair?

Mrs. Hill: Just all day - go early and stay late.

Interviewer: Did you have to bring your own dinner or did they have?

Mrs. Hill: Yes, uh huh, they'd take a basket dinner and eat the, they had an area where everybody ate, especially a get together maybe with some neighbors and share your dinner. Oh I think those women could cook too, they had such rich, good food. I bet we really didn't think about getting fat. There was one neighbor of ours, man alive, she was the biggest woman I think I ever saw. She was mammoth and she ate like that too because they had cream on everything you know.

Interviewer: Would you and your friend go to the fair together?

Mrs. Hill: My father would take us and we'd go off by ourselves but we were grown up then.

Interviewer: Did the fair have any special shows, side shows?

Mrs. Hill: Yes, we didn't dare go into anything like that. We weren't sure. I don't think I ever went into the side shows. Then once a year the circus would come to town and we'd always go to that.

Interviewer: It would come to LaPorte?

Mrs. Hill: Or to Michigan City, we used to go down here to the circus. That's it. There wasn't so much, but when something did come you went and you appreciated it. Now there's so many things that you don't know which to pick out.

Interviewer: You can get overwhelmed with things now.

Mrs. Hill: That's right. I think that's the way it was with lots of the children these days.

[End of tape]