5

A. Varesano interviewing Mary Washko -1- 7/19/72

Tape 23-1

AV: What did the woman do in the house?

MW: Well, years ago, she had all the responsibility. She had to take care of
the children, take care of the clothes, work in the garden, wash clothes on
the wash board. In her spare time she had to sew--you couldn't buy clothes
as you do today. In the summer you took the children out to the woods,
picked huckleberries, come home, give them a little bite to eat, then start
washin' clothes. In the night, you'd be workin' back again in the garden.
Every weekend you'd bake bread, cake, so you'd have enough for the children
for the weekend. Then, like in the fall, when the huckleberries were gone,
you'd do your cannin', whatever vegetables you raised in the garden, you'd
do your cannin'. Then, you'd try and get your coal--that's the anthracite--
to burn in the winter. You had a chance to pick it, you'd want to pick it,
you didn't have to buy it and pay for it. Then, the children went in to
school, it was gettin' 'em off to school, comin' home for recess, give them
a couple minutes with a cookie or somethin', send them back, then lunchtime
again--because school was right here in town, they didn'thave to be bussed--
and in the evening the same thing, you'd take the children, they all had
their chores, you'd take them down to the slate banks, pick some coal, have
them haul it in, have them work a little bit in the garden, or pick potato
bugs!

AV: Did the mother of the house actually pick coal, or did she just show the way
for the children?

MW: No, she actually picked with them and fill the bag up, or buckets, and
carry it home. Or, if you had a bag, you'd put it over a barrel and push it
home.

AV: Did she take them out to pick coal?

MW: Yeah, most of them, if they were smaller. If they were older, they took
care of themselves. And by the time you got them home, gave them a bite to
eat again, washed everything up, well, they had a little bit of school work,
not like they do now, so you had to be with them. And the men were busy,
too. They'd get home from work, they'd be takin' a bath, you had to wash
their backs, get their water warm, spill it in a little tub--you didn't have
no bathrooms.

AV: Where would they wash them?

MW: Well, they'd, in the kitchen, they'd put the tub in there, they'd kneel on
the floor, and just get--because they were them round tubs, they weren't the
oval tubs like they have now--and wash so far, and then, wash their backs and
all, and then they'd finish up washin'. You'd give them their supper, and
whatever they had to do, they done their chores, in the evening.

AV: What king of men's chores were there to do?

MW: Oh, there was choppin' wood, fixin' fences, workin' in the garden, pickin'
coal, too....

AV: The men pciked coal at the end of the day?

MW: Oh, yes. After mining so long, then they'd still even pick some! So,
everybody was kept busy. And in the fall when it got cooler already a lot
of times, and the evenings were long, people had geese and ducks, they'd
pluck them, and save the feathers. You had to pluck feathers to make
pillows.

AV: The women did this?

MW: The women and the children, the girls.

AV: Didn't the boys help out with plucking feathers?

MW: Well, they did, but they weren't handy at it like the girls. And boy, it
was tough! You couldn't laugh, you couldn't sneeze, or nothin', the feathers
would fly all over!