Vol. 1-Interview-Feisner

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GF: were mumified, there's an angel entering here, someone unusual, I didn't realise the significance and Mrs. Coxe walked in all in black, a little bit of a black bonnet monacle with a black ribbon and she went up and greeted the teacher and I don't know if the teacher had brains enought to greet her but anyhow then we sang oh we made a lot of noise, but to Mrs. Coxe it was the most beautiful music she ever heard, she'd tell us that and in a sweet voice and her whole heart and soul was in it caused us to feel that we sang beautifully well you know it was impossible then she told us that she would not forget us that we would receive a Christmas gift from her and I'll never forget, I can see Mr. Fisher at the livery stable too, horse drawn sled come down with these big boxes mind for about 30 youngsters and sometimes you had to take them apart before you got them in the school door then they were given out during the program, this program and the parents had to attend this program and my what a program that was no music but singing and our recitations there were 30 people there were 30 recitations and everybody applauded well the teacher would call the names, George Feissner a Flixiflyer sled, a dollar, an orange, a winter cap and a box of candy, Mary Jones - a tam-o-shanter, a doll, a sweater and a box of candy and an orange.

HF: The bigger girls use to get enough material for a dress but always an orange and that was a treat because we didn't get oranges like we do today.

GF: I got a sled but youngster lower than me got a horn and he started to cry right then and there he wanted a sled, well everything was written down and the teacher had an awful time quieting him and when the parents left they blamed the teacher because he didn't get a sled like George Feissner did that wasn't right she did that, the teacher, that teacher she's not going to teach here next year.

HF: That went according to age

GF: Yes but you know Mrs. Coxe was a very religious woman, we lived in Buck Mountain across the road from a beautiful grove of pines oh tall pines and there wasn't any vegetation underneath just pine needles, twice a year she would have drivers

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GF: drive her and her nurse in a two seated rather tired rig down there and they would stop in front of our place and she would walk thru that grove of pines and she said she just loved hearing the wind sighing in the top most branches it would comfort her soul, she could worship there she just loved it she was that kind of person now in Eckley kids got presents

HF: And in Drifton

GF: And in Beaver Meadows too, Coal Rain etc. but we youngsters that went to the Presbyterian church got 2 presents, so some of the kids here thought they'd better go to the Presbyterian church whether they were Presbyterians or not but she was a grand lady. Now Miss Whiteman who was a nurse lived here hired by Mrs. Coxe and was paid by Mrs. Coxe her office was equipped by Mrs. Coxe she made daily visits thru the town and wherever she saw a card in the window, see Dr. Maise had a red card, Dr. Neil had a yellow card, Dr. Truckmiller had a blue card and so on and she would come in and investigate, and some times she would come into a home and she would investigate and she would ask what kind of food they were serving the youngsters, well she would say we have to get an order for them and she would send this information to someone, Mrs. Coxe's secretary and the order was brought there was milk, shoes, clothing and so forth and maybe Johnny was having difficulty in school well Miss Whiteman would say, well we have to have his eyes examined on Saturday, now she had a nurse here and a nurse in Drifton and on a Saturday they'd have as high as 15, 20 youngsters, take them by train to Lehighton to Dr. Kistler to have their eyes examined and fitted with glasses all by Mrs. Coxe. We told you about Mr. Steffon, well Mr. Steffon was just an ordinary boy about town and he and his mother went for huckleberries, did you tell her this story, well on the way home they had their pails filled and up here where the breaker was a train of cars loaded with coal and as a car was filled at the breaker and ran down hit the train of cars they moved a bit, now Andrew and his mother coming home from berries were confronted with this train of cars the mother said

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let us walk around the cars and the boys said, no mother I'll crawl under the cars and meet you when you come around while he was under the car they ran a car down from the breaker and they hit this train of cars and it moved just about that much and one wheel rested on his leg and on on his arm now my father was a first-aid man and they called for my father now the pont that I'm going to make is that I'm going to tell you the complete story involving Mrs. Coxe he carried him in his shoeing apron now that was a leather apron, carried him up to the first-aid and the hand was hanging and it was just hanging by a piece of tissue and he snipped it and gave it his mother, but the point is he was hospitalized now Mrs. Coxe was interested in him she paid for his hospitalization bought him an artificial hand and an artificial leg and it so happened that he got back to school and he was wearing the artificial arm and the artificial leg Mrs. Coxe came to visit the school I was in his class and at an appropriate time during her visit he got up came out of the seat and it was really a dramatic moment and he walked up the aisle with some difficulty he wasn't used to the artificial leg and he thanked Mrs. Coxe for what she did. I'll never forget what she said "My young man if I could spend every cent of money that I have to restore that leg and that arm that I would do for you," and tears rolled down her cheeks she took him and she saw to it that he went to the Miner's Mechanical and there was no tuition or anything else and then to Lehigh University and paid for all his schooling and saw to it that he had a life time job at the Institute in Freeland where he taught for about 40 years/ and my son whose love for mathematics is very great starts with this man Steffon, he was a great teacher a crude fellow in many respects in the classroom but you got it, you had to get it

HF: And he always appreciated what she done for him, he never forgets on Thanksgiving Day a group of boys from Miners goes down to her grave and puts at wreath on

GF: Oh she was a remarkable person but there was so many people took advantage of her, with lies, people with means with money in the bank would plead poverty

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GF: and receive aid, assistance. Mrs. Coxe yes a remarkable [individual] woman an angel of the coal fields now she left a lot of money to be used, how I'm not altogther sure a lady in Drifton who incidentally is an Episcopalian I can't think of her name administers, some money goes to the Mechanical Institution and other for poverty purposes, people in need but, poverty is not dispensed with on the scale today as it was when she lived, she was remarkable

HF: And when a man was killed in the mines his widow didn't have to pay any rent but you know after she died there was people living in Drifton were getting aid from her because they were supposed to be so poverty stricken and they lived there up until the time that she died and after she died they came in to Freeland and built beautiful, big homes and lived very nicely

GF: Well now something just came to mind when you were talking about husbands that were killed that brought to me an experience in first-aid, I was first-aid man here with my father and some other men

HF: Our Pete was on the team

GF: Yes I think that Pete was on at this particular time now this is another story that concerns my dad, now his brand of wit, we received some information from the mines #2 Slope that they were bringing out a miner that was deathly sick a fellow that lived up on Back Street but anyhow they brought him into the first aid room and he was pale and he had been regurgitating, vomiting, my dad was a good first aid man, a fearless type of fellow and he said, Mike what did you eat for breakfast, I ate the bacon, well you know at that time we got the bacon in a slab, how much did you eat, maybe half a pound for breakfast? Yeh, did you that black rind on it, I eata everything, so my dad begn to smile and went over to the cupboard and we had a big tin cup there, more than a pint and there was a box of Epsom Salts standing there and he took about so much and put it into the cup filled it up with water and he said, here drink this, and Mike said,

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GF: and my dad said, Scotts Emulsion, Scotts Emulsion I never hear that before, so dad said, drink it, so he drank it and made a lot of bad looking faces, and dad said to one of the men, take him home, they took him home and the next day Mike wasn't at work

HF: I can imagine why

GF: So the evening of that day after work dad went down to Mike's home and of course dad knew that Mike had a little bottle and of course my dad liked a little nip and he said, Mike how do you feel, Oh I feel good but no sleep last night why not, oh, pants down all night

HF: I can imagine after all that Epsom Salts, he wasn't sick anyhow

GF: Well you know on the other hand I saw some very sad things, you remember Bruno father, Bruno Lagonosky, Bruno's father was a nice man a clean, quiet a man to be respected, used good judgment now he and his buddy Valentine who lived up town here a big tall fellow were working together, they were both miners, now they ran a car into the face of the breast, they put a branch in and the coal and they were both on the same side of the car if this was the car one was on this side shoveling this way and like where Angela is the other was shoveling in the same car and they heard something above they thought it was protected and Valentine looked up and a chunk half as big as that stove came down and hit him in the face and one portion of it hit Bruno's father in the back well Bruno's father died instantly and when we took him out there wasn't one mark on his body, his body was clean, it was a Monday, he had put all new clean mining garments on and the other man was conscious and the peak of his face was broken off and his eyes were gone and we sent for old Dr. Neil and Dr. Neil arrived and said, where does he live, and I said, and he said you'd better go for his wife, he's going to pass away, I went up for his wife and she was out picking huckleberries and by the time I got back, he was dead. Now things of that sort, now here's another interesting thing