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Hunter, Vera (audio interview #1 of 3)
INTERVIEW DESCRIPTION - This is the first of three interviews with Vera Hunter, conducted in the living room of the small tract house in Lakewood, which she shares with her daughter. Hunter was somewhat distant in the beginning of the interview, but did eventually relax. The audio quality on side b is poor. 5/17/1980
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- 2021-08-23
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- SUBJECT BIO - Vera Hunter was working as a chambermaid and janitor in Port Hueneme before getting a job as an assembler at Lockheed Aircraft. The last of eight children, born in Colorado, Hunter was raised by her paternal grandparents following here father's death while she was still an infant. She married when she was nineteen, and worked outside the home intermittently, doing occasional day work as a domestic. She and her husband moved to California during the Depression. Hunter retuned to full-time homemaking when she was laid off after the war, and then worked at various jobs, until 1951, when she returned to Lockheed, working there until she retired in 1971. Three interviews were conducted with Hunter in the living room of the small suburban tract home, where she lives with her daughter. Hunter was often distant at the beginning of an interviews, though at other times she was more relaxed and spoke her mind plainly. TOPICS - family background and history; schooling; living arrangements; siblings; father's death; mother's work history; move to La Junta, Colorado; family life; social activities; farm life; move to Creston, Iowa; farm rliving arrangements in Creston, Iowa; housing; mother; household and farm chores; menstruation; schooling; future expectations; social activities; childhood activities; Normal school; and husband; Note: the audiohusband's work history; religion; WWI influenza epidemic; hospitalization during second pregnancy; housing and living arrangements; husband; marital relationship; pregnancies and children; life during the Depressioearly work experiences; husband's attitude towards her working outside the home; applying for work at Lockheed; attitude about going to work; wages; work clothing; and daughter;
- *** File: rrrvhunter1.mp3 Audio Segments and Topics: (0:00-5:09)... Hunter was born on October 1, 1903 near Monte Vista, Colorado. Her father died when she was eight months old. She grew up near her mother's parents and she was very close to them. After her grandfather died, when she was six years old, she went to live with her aunt and uncle in La Junta, Colorado. Two years later, she moved to Iowa to live with her father's side of the family. Although the family was "closed mouthed," she recently learned that six great uncles were killed during the Civil War. She also heard that there was some Indian blood on her father's side, but could not confirm it because her great aunt discarded the family records. She believes that her grandfather immigrated to the US from Germany. Both of her parent's families originally settled in Indiana and migrated to Iowa via covered wagon. They both supported themselves as ranchers and farmers. (5:09-7:46)... Hunter's parents met and married in Clearfield, Iowa. They had four children in Iowa, where her grandfather owned a store. In the late 1800s, the family moved to Colorado just outside Monte Vista. Her father purchased a farm and her grandfather took up ranching. Her parents had four more children in Colorado, including Hunter who was the youngest of eight children. Her mother gave birth to a baby every two years. (7:46-12:16)... Her father died from a heart condition believed to have been precipitated by an incident that occurred while he was thrashing grain. Her mother managed the farm with her sons' assistance for about two years, and then sold the farm. The family moved to another ranch and she was paid to take care of the property. They moved into town (Monte Vista) about two years later and her mother got a job at a hotel. When Hunter's grandfather died a couple of years later, her sister went to live with their grandmother and Hunter moved in with her aunt and uncle. She lived with them for about two years. (12:16-14:07)... Hunter's mother was about twenty years old when she married; and thirty-two when she gave birth to Hunter. She had a grade school education and had never worked before she married. After Hunter's father died, her mother went to work for the first time in her life. She got a job as a chamber maid and a cook at a hotel in the town of Monte Vista. (14:07-20:28)... Hunter lived with her aunt and uncle in La Junta, Colorado for two years, starting when she was six. They lived on a farm in the prairie located about fifteen miles from La Junta. Her uncle grew alfalfa and cane. Hunter walked three miles to and from school, which usually lasted only six weeks because the school was closed when the snow blizzards started. While she was living in Colorado, she did not have any contact with her immediate felt alone; her aunt and uncle were not very loving towards her. They were musicians and members of a literary society and Hunter accompanied them into town when they performed. Occasionally, they went to the circus or to dances, but Hunter always felt like "excess luggage." Hunter's grandmother eventually took her away from La Junta because of the way she was treated. (20:28-24:44)... She continues to discuss her living arrangements with her aunt and uncle and the circumstances that led her to leave their home. After she left La Junta, her grandmother took her to live with her father's siblings in Creston, Iowa. She lived in Iowa until she was eighteen years old, when she married. [Note: there is an interruption in the tape when Hunter pauses to retrieve several photographs of family members in Iowa. ] (24:44-28:33)... Hunter lived on a farm with her aunts and uncles in Iowa. They raised farm animals and cultivated a large vegetable garden, which she maintained during the summer. Her uncle rented farmland from local farmers on which he grew grain and corn. During WWI, Hunter helped her uncle harvest the grain and shuck corn. She also helped him with miscellaneous farm tasks, including baling hay. On armistice day, she only had to shuck corn for half the day because they planned to go into town that evening to celebrate the end of the war. End of tape. *** File: rrrvhunter2.mp3 (0:00-0:48)... Hunter's living arrangements and home life in Iowa were far better than the conditions in Colorado when she lived with her aunt and uncle. Although they were poor, "we had good food and clean beds [which] was something that a lot of orphan kids didn't have." (0:48-4:12)... She corresponded with her mother after she moved to Iowa and they occasionally visited each other when Hunter reached adulthood. Hunter visited her mother on three occasions in the 1950s before she died in 1957 at the age of eighty-six. (4:12-7:40)... Hunter describes her family's home in Iowa. Her aunts and uncle boarded one of their rooms out to two school teachers and several family members came for periodic stays while Hunter lived there. At one time, there were thirteen people living in their four-bedroom home. She shared a room with her aunt. (7:40-9:36)... Note: the audio quality in this segment is only fair. While living on the farm in Iowa, Hunter was responsible for both the household and farm chores. (9:36-12:03)... Note: the audio quality in this segment is fair. Her aunts did not work outside the home. Her oldest aunt practiced midwifery, but she was not paid for her services. Hunter was not allowed to go with her aunt when she went on house calls. Hunter never knew about her aunt's activities until years later, stating, "I lived a very sheltered life." Her aunts never talked to her about menstruation. She describes the day she first started her period. Her aunt provided her with a pad and said "It'll be that way every month. Keep your clothes clean." (12:03-12:28)... Note: the audio quality in this segment is fair. Hunter describes the type of clothing she wore when she was a young girl. (12:28-14:23)... Note: the audio quality in this segment is fair. Hunter attended grammar and intermediate school until the tenth grade. She went to the town school in Creston to finish eleventh and twelfth grade. She took eight subjects while in grammar school. She talks about her studies. (14:23-18:05)... Note: the audio quality in this segment is fair. Hunter did not think about the future when she was growing up. Her main thoughts revolved around having a good time and spending time with friends. She was closely restricted and supervised by her aunts, so she was relieved whenever she could get out of the house. She describes the social activities she enjoyed when she was a young girl and also talks about the childhood games she played when she was in school. (18:05-21:14)... Note: the audio quality in this segment is fair. When Hunter attended school in Creston she had a lot more freedom; however, she was too busy with her studies to enjoy it. She lived with an aunt and a cousin during the week and returned to her family's farm on the weekends. Her aunts and uncle insisted that she go to normal school to pursue a career in teaching. However, the country schools were closed and one had to have four years of country school experience to teach at a town school. Hunter was relieved about this because she did not have enough patience to deal with small children. She figured that she would get married and spend the rest of her life like everyone else in the country. During the Depression, however, she decided to move to California in search of better job opportunities. She mentions her husband's work history. (21:14-23:31)... Note: the audio quality in this segment is only fair. Hunter married when she was nineteen years old. At the time, she was still attending high school explaining that her education was interrupted while she was in La Junta, Colorado. Her studies during high school consisted of a normal school curriculum. (23:31-28:36)... Note: the audio quality is only fair. Hunter met her husband at a class picnic while she was in high school. She avoided going on a date with him for six weeks after they met. She discusses her husband's family background. End of tape. *** File: rrrvhunter3.mp3 (0:00-1:51)... She continues to discuss her husband's background, focusing on his work history with the railroad. They dated for about eight or nine months before they got married. (1:51-7:56)... Her mother's side of the family were strict Baptist, but they did not attend church services regularly because the church was located a far distance from their home. Her father's side of the family were practicing Methodists and went to church every Sunday. Her uncle was active in the church and a member of the choir for many years. He just stopped going to church and Hunter could never figure out why. She talks about the flu epidemic that swept the country during WWI. Her uncle contracted the virus after he attended an Evangelist meeting in Creston. He brought the virus home to the rest of his family and Hunter was confined to bed for more than ten days. There is some confusion about hospital care and she clarifies that she was admitted to the hospital for the flu virus several years later while she was pregnant. While in the hospital she received an appendectomy, a cesarean section, and one of her fallopian tubes was removed. Doctors told her that she would not live for more than five days, at which time her mother came to Iowa to visit her in the hospital. (7:56-9:02)... Hunter's "old maid aunt" made all of the household decisions and her uncle took care of the farm and the livestock. (9:02-11:29)... After Hunter married, she and her husband rented a home in Creston so that he could be near the railroad yard. He was on call twenty-four hours and filled in when employees did not show up for duty or when the railroad laid someone off. He was home whenever he was not working his regular hours at the railroad yard. (11:29-14:20)... She describes her husband as a man with a dual personality. He was proud of his Irish blood and use to tell Hunter that Irishmen fought at the drop of a hat. Hunter got so sick of hearing this that one day she told him, "In my estimation it don't take much of a man to start a fight. It takes a dog gone good one to stay out of a fight." Her husband never mentioned his Irish fighting tendencies to her again. He was well behaved at work, but occasionally snapped at their neighbors if they woke him up during the day. He worked the evening shift and spent the majority of the day sleeping. When Hunter went to work in defense during the war, she was told that even though people on the graveyard shift had more freedom and were not well supervised, they produced more airplanes. (14:20-15:06)... She and her husband did not have much of a social life because of his work schedule. Occasionally, they went to shows and visited with neighbors. She took trips to places like Chicago and Colorado using her husband's railroad passes. He did not accompany her because he could not take any time off from work. (15:06-17:02)... Hunter was responsible for managing her household. Her husband gave her his paycheck, which she used to pay their household expenses and purchase anything they needed for the home. Her daily activities involved taking care of her home and her child. (17:02-18:20)... Hunter's first child, a daughter, was born in 1924. Her second child was delivered via a cesarean section. She experienced complications during both pregnancies and feels that her first child probably should have been delivered through cesarean. [Note: this daughter seems to be the only child that survived.] (18:20-21:54)... Her husband was laid off from the railroad yard in Iowa in 1932. In 1934, they decided to move to California in search of better job opportunities. Two of her sisters were already living in California and her brother-in-law owned a hay business in Paramount. When they arrived in California, her husband went to work for her brother-in-law. They moved to Glendale a year later and he got a job at Forest Lawn Mortuary. He worked at Forest Lawn for about a year, and was then hired by Southern Pacific Railroad. In 1943, he was hit by a train and lost his arm. He continued to work for Southern Pacific until he died in 1947. Hunter began working at Lockheed in 1943. (21:54-23:37)... When her husband started working at Southern Pacific, they left Glendale and moved to Los Angeles to be closer to his work. They lived in a "no man's land" that was bordered by Elysian Park, Lincoln Heights, Highland Park, and Glassell. (23:37-26:20)... Hunter and her family managed during the Depression by eating food grown in their vegetable garden. After they moved to California, the money that her husband earned was used for groceries. When he was hired at Southern Pacific, he was paid biweekly and the first two weeks pay was held back for tools and equipment. Hunter found day work as a housecleaner so that she could buy groceries for her family. They survived on meat, rice, gravy, and bread because her husband needed something to "stick to his bones and by that time, he had a good paycheck and the worst of it was over." (26:20-27:25)... In the early 1940s, her husband was transferred to Port Hueneme to work on the railroad. They lived in a hotel and Hunter did some janitorial work at the Port. When he finished his job, they returned to Los Angeles and purchased a home in 1943. She lived there until 1978. End of tape. *** File: rrrvhunter4.mp3 (0:00-4:27)... Except for doing housecleaning during the Depression, working at Port Hueneme was Hunter's first job. She decided to go to work because she was bored and did not want to be like the other women at the hotel. She was proud of herself for getting a job. When she applied at Lockheed, she was surprised that they wanted her to start at the plant the very next day. She recalls having to go out and purchase a pair of "britches," which was the first time she ever wore pants. Her starting wage at Lockheed was .65 cents an hour. Her husband was opposed to her working outside the home because he "didn't think it looked very good for a woman to help support the husband." He pressured her to quit Lockheed after the war, but she insisted that she stay there until she was laid off. (4:27-6:13)... Her oldest daughter graduated from high school in 1941 when she was eighteen years. Hunter and her husband went to Port Hueneme that same year. While in high school, her daughter took civil service courses and as soon as she graduated, she received a notice to report for civil service work. End of tape.
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