Vol. 1-Interview-Falatko

Waln Brown interviewing Clifford Falatko -1- 8/30/72 Tape 5-1 WB: You used to live by the church up here, the Catholic Church? CF: Yes, the second house, second door, second block, in the first house there were but three boys and four or five girls, in the second there were 2 girlsand 2 boys in the third house there were 3 boys, they had no girls, in our house there were 14 of us. WB: 14? this is when you were a kid now? CF: Yeh, when we were kids, in the third house in every house there were 12, 13 kids WB: There were a lot of kids around. CF: The boys were grown up the girls were grown up everybody had big families here WB: What did you do when you were a kid, do you remember some of the stuff that you used to do? Games you used to play? Social activities that all the kids would do together? CF: Oh the only thing we used to shoot crap or something like that, nothing like WB: But with all those kids around you must have had a real good time with all those kids around there was a lot of kids to play with? CF: Lots of kids to play with but some of them they weren't allowed to play in those days there was Slavish, Polish, Greek, Irish or Dutch some of them weren't allowed to play with each other, you had to play with your own, maybe you were Slavish or Irish their people wouldn't like it, it's not like now everything is the same, what would the church say, he's going to his church, he's not going to our church that was the Catholic Church, the Slavish people weren't allowed to go there. WB: That was mostly Irish up in that church wasn't it? CF: The Irish couldn't get to our church, I don't remember but my Daddy, may his soul rest, you couldn't get close to the church Sunday morning. On the back street there was nothing but Irish people. WB: On Back Street? CF: On Back Street in them homes, you couldn't get close to that church on Sunday morning- goats! they'd be chasing you like hell. WB: The Irish would? CF: Goats, nanny goats, they had so much thats what they lived on, but today everything's the same. WB: Didn't the Irish, Slavish, Polish and the Greeks, I guess the Irish sort of stayed to themselevs and did the Polish and the Slavish and the Greeks sort of stay to themselves, or did the Greek people stay with the Greeks and the Dutch stay with the Dutch? CF: What do you mean? WB: Well when you were a kid you said the Slavish couldn't play with the Irish. CF: They used to play, but their parents didn't like it much but the children used play together, yes. WB: The kids were too young to know the difference, the parents were the only ones that were nasty about it. CF: But if you wanted to get married you'd say, I'm Slavish, I want to get married to a Polish, their people would say, "Please don't marry a Slovak," and maybe our parents would say, "Don't marry a Polander," again it they had trouble themselves but today WB: Everybody marries everybody. CF: And we wasn't allowed to go to their church and they wasn't allowed to come to our church like Protestants that new church there, it was Reformed, St. John's Church, Luthern; St James, Episcopal, that was a big church. WB: Those were mostly attended by German people weren't they?

Waln Brown interviewing Clifford Falatko -2- 8/20/72 Tape 5-1 CF We had lots of Germans here, I'm, telllin' you on this corner here the whole gosh dam thing you couldn't buy a house here it was all Protestants, lots of Protestants only one family that was living here across the S----- --------- Patrushka there were always Greek people living in that house but the rest of them they were all Dutch and above they were mixed already and down here there were, how many, quite a few homes all the way down, all Dutch. WB How come all the Dutch got houses down here? CF They were mostly bosses and everything else I guess. WB These were mostly bosses homes so the Dutch were mostly bosses? So they live in the bottom part of the town here? CF Mostly, bosses and teachers. WB And up town was mostly Irish and CF The Back Street was nothing but Irish, the second street from the breaker up Protestant homes now, Irish, that was Irish Street they used to call it and down here, Shanty Street that was WB That was Dutch too? CF They were mixed already there was quite a few, now everybody went away right after the first war they started going. WB That's when all the young people started to leave I guess? CF Yeh, well the mine shut down because there was nothin' but mines there, was no strippins' here the beautiful places down here were swamp, around this way you could see all the way down around the cemetary you could see all the way down, now today you can't see because it's all strippin', that's the way it goes. WB But say for instance when you were living up on the Back Street did you come down through this part of the town or would you get in trouble? CF No we used to come down some times some of the kids would holler this or throw a stone at you or something, very few, they were mainly because we used to go to the same school you know, the same teachers, they didn't bother much WB Was there much trouble like much fighting between the kids like the Greek kids against the Polish kids? CF No, no, we got along nice the parents didn't like that too much you know. WB But the kids got along pretty fine? CF Yeh. WB What did a kid do around Eckley besides go to school? CF Well nothin', in the summer time we went for huckleberries or for coal, that's all they could do, or work in the garden because everybody had a big garden and thay all had cows and pigs and everything, they had to help to clean up the pigs and cows and help the parents. WB The children had lot of chores? CF Oh yeh. WB A lot of work to be done, but they had some play time too didn't they? CF Oh yeh, they had lots of time they used to go to shows, the movies, walk over to Freeland, 3 miles over and 3 miles back, we used to pay 3 cents that was a theatre one time I don't know what we used to call it, I don't think of it, that used to be a theatre where that A & P, that grocery store, so we used to go there, 3 cents. WB Three cents to go to the movies, boy that's cheap. CF Yeh, and walk over and walk back, well we'd get 10 cents or 15 cents we'd buy penny bags they used to call them for 2 cents, candy and gum and stuff like that and way comin' home - chew. But we enjoyed it, but dances, when we were big already there was lots of dances in Freeland about 3 times a week WB And you'd walk over to Freeland to the dances? CF Walk over and back.

WALN BROWN INTERVIEWING CLIFFORD FALATKO -3- 8/20/72 Tape 5-1 WB Would the boys take the girls or would the girls walk by themselves? CF No, sometimes they had a lantern, a carbine latern, no oil lamp or lantern there were 10 or 15 together, there was no oil like this. They were farm roads, all mud, only in the daytime you could go right from the store where the store is, right across over the mountain, it was a short cut, you know, in the daytime it was nice to go too, in the night you couldn't go the short cut it was too dark used to take the road used to go to church, STATIONS of the cross or something you'd have to walk all the way around but now the roads are good but whose goin' to walk, they wouldn't walk from here to the WB Well now you don't need to walk anymore there's cars and things like that. CF Well I'm afraid to go by car to Freeland I don't like to ride. I don' t like to ride honest to God you wouldn't believe it, there's so many accidents you can never tell if something going to happen but it will happen no matter where you're at. WB Did you always work in the mines here at Eckley? How old were you when you started working the mines? CF Yes, well I'll tell you when I started to work first I started to work down at Hazle Brook it's more than three miles from here over on top of the mountain. WB There's a Hazle Brook Road that still goes though there. CF There is no Hazle Brook Road now. WB There's an old path that goes through down here you can the whole way to Hazle Brook. CF Past ------ there was an old road you could take the railroad down and then there was an old road that went over top, over the mountain, it's more than 3 miles. WB You used to walk that each day? CF Yeh, and walk day and night, sure. WB How old were you then? CF About 13. WB What was you first job in the mines? CF That wasn't in the mines, that was pickin slate on the breakers for 6 cents an hour. 10 hours a day, pickin' slate, 6 cents an hour. WB You were picking slate out of the coal, where was that at? CF Hazle Brook WB Oh you were a breaker boy? CF Yeh, that's what I'm sayin', on a breaker. WB Oh I see, you used to sit on one of those little things and pick the slate out CF I just had a little bench and the coal was coming down a chute you just take it out that's all, all day long. WB That was pretty tough on your hands wasn't it? CF Tough! your fingers were red, bleedin', but then we got some kinds of pads they used to the company used to give us pads, rubber pads, not rubber but might as well say rubber, anyhow that didn't hurt our hands too much - for 10 hours. WB That must have been rough? CF Yeh, 10 hours. WB That's a long time to be sitting there, I'll bet that raised a lot of dust didn't it? CF No there wasn't too much dust on a breaker, mostly water because that coal don't go dry, the coal was gettin' washed with water see? Soon as they dump it from the coal mine on top and from the shakers goes to big rollers, it cracks the coal chestnut, pea coal and rice coal, different sizes goes in

-48-20- 72 Tape 5-1 Waln Brown interviewing Clifford Falatko

different chutes. It's all washed, it's not dry WB but you were 13 yrs, old when you started CF 13 Yeh. WB Did you work on the breaker very long picking slate? CF 3 yrs.y, maybe better than 3 yrs. then I got a job here on this breaker. WB Were you picking slate on the Eckley breaker? CF Yeah, I was picking slate. Then I was watchin' jiggs, jiggs was where the coal goes up and down and shakes the small stuff goes on the bottom and the bigger stuff on top. That's what I was watchin' . For about a year. That's all. WB Then you were about 16 I guess. CF And then I got a job roundin' the coal. This here big car that goes on a railroad track runnin' the cars down under the chute there where they were loadin' cars on the railroad? I was there for a while. I didn't like it. I got the hell in the mines. WB What did you do to bring the coal? You said you ran the cars, did you have a little lokey that you pulled them with? CF No, not down the breaker. You had a brake just start the car out and the car would go under the chute and just stop it. WB You would just drift down. CF No, it was level. WB. Did you have to push it? CF No. It would start itself, if it wouldn't there was a guy that would give it a pitch. WB And then after that you went in the mines? CF I went in the mines for a while. WB How old were you when you went in the mines? Do you remember 17 or 18? CF about 17. WB What did you do in the mines? Were you a contract miner? CF No it was company work, workin' on the railroad patchin', helpin', on a motor used to pull the coal around. WB Was that with mules? CF No motor, from the beginning in some parts they had mules but I was down in Buck Mountain. WB Oh that's right, in Buck Mountain they had motors before. they never had motors in the Eckley mines, did they, except for the last couple of years? CF Just in the last couple of years, not long. WB But you were patch on one of those motors for a couple of years? CF Well, that's what happened to me when I broke my leg down in Sandy Valley. On the (white space) I was patchin' on a motor and that son of a bitch, bastardly man I have to call him, he's dead already, Helen Fedorsha's brother, I was patchin' for him. He was a mean devil. He was awful mean to me. He knowed there was a big door oh bigger than this, long, bigger not wide but higher and iron door, it's supposed to open on both sides or the other, automatic, and had a light trip, just a few cars to go in or out he would stop the motor. And the motors gone in and out. You're supposed to open one side or the other automatic and that door wasn't right, he knew it, it wasn't right and lots of times when he had a light trip, just a few cars to go in or out he would stop the motor and then he'd get up and I'd open the door from one side to the other and I'd put cement blocks to keep the door open till he passed with the motor then go and close the door because you had to keep it closed on account of the miners so they'd get air because the air was comin' from the outside and you had to kept that closed. That day he had 13 big gondolers, big cars, jetto (Jeddo) cars we used to call them,13, and 2 big trucks of timber to go in, that was the last trip about a quarter of 2, that was the last trip, we were supposed to take for the night shift miners in it was the month of June there was lots of huckleberries and that bastard was workin' day and

Waln Brown interviewing Clifford Falatko 8/20/72 Tape 5-1 night picking' huckleberries and he couldn't wait to go home, go up for huckleberries and so he knowed that long trip and the cars started bumpin' because they were only that far apart, they started bumpin, Jesus lover, it takes awhile before they stopped the motor, he didn't stop it, we went right through the door and the door opened and the side of the car, a big iron caught my leg right on that, yeh that's what happened. WB What did they do with you afterwards when, after the accident, what did they do did the first-aid team come down and work on you or CF What did they do? There was so much coal in the tunnel, loaded cars, that they couldn't get me out, they got me over top, top of the cars to get me to the surface by the door to get me out, they couldn't get the doctor from Freeland, compensation doctor, we had compensation doctor, the company had, couldn't get the doctor, they couldn't get the doctor for about 2 hours, they had me out in the sun, month of June the 15th it was that hot layin' me on the stretcher outside out in mud and in blood, when they got me to the hospital they couldn't even wash me, Dr. Kettrick, he's still in that hospital, my leg didn't have to be stiff but they couldn't fix it, there was too much dirt, the sun got it or some gosh thing, it was, but they couldn't clean it out they had me layin' outside. Dr. Dice he wanted to cut my leg off, the main doctor, but Dr. Kettrick's still in the hospital, Dice is dead I think, one of the Dice's, but Kettrick said, "No he's goin' to have a stiff leg," because my muscles and cords and everything were all drawn up, "he's goin' to have a stiff leg but we're going to save hs leg," so I have a leg, thank God, I got myself better than a good one, if it wasn't for Dr. Kettrick everytime I go to the hospital he wnated to operate on me 2 weeks ago, I have real trouble inside, he examined me and said, "Clifford it has to done or it will strangle you," but when it happened he had nurses ready, and bed ready and he promised be, because 2 or 3 weeks he was the main guy in the hospital, he said, "Clifford I know you don't have that much money for this operation and everything, I know your case and everything I'm goin' to do for nothin'," he was satisfied to do it for nothin' but what the hell happened I went to a veteran's hospital I got my gall bladder taken out. I just came home about 3 days but I have to go back to the state hospital but he had the nurse and everything ready for me, I told the nurse I changed my mind, but I was scared, I was afraid because I seen those kinds of cases you know, how they do it and how they suffer, I know what it is but I said I changed by mind, I did go. A couple of times when I went to the hospital he said, "Are you still livin' Clifford?" I said, "Yeh doctor," he didn't get to talk to me he thought I made a fool out of him, you know, he was a good doctor, good to me and he's good to me now, yeh, he's a nice doctor. WB When you had your leg cut off how old were you? Not off, when you had that accident, how old were you? CF How old? Well I'm goin' to be 77 and it was 17 yrs, in June 15 it was 17 years. WB You were about 60 when that happened? CF 59, 60. 17 yrs. it will be about 60, yeh. WB I'm interested, what happened in the family, what was the man's role in the family in a mine town, for instance you lived here when you were young so your father worked in the mines didn't he? CF He was killed in the mines too, up here. WB Oh he was? In number 6 up here? CF Number 2 where this breaker is.