Cooper School Oral History Project

COOPER SCHOOL ORAL HISTORY PROJECT

EDITED DRAFT

Georgia Baxter

Youngstown, 1929-37

Audiotape

[This is an interview with Georgia Baxter on May 22, 2003.

The interviewers are Philippa Nye and Edie Neeson. The transcriber is Jolene Bernhard.]

Philippa: This is an interview of Georgia Baxter for the Cooper School Oral History Project. This is Philippa Nye and Edie Neeson as interviewers and it’s May 22, 2003. Do you want to repeat what you just said?

Georgia: I don’t remember my first day of school. I just remember being hurt while in that first grade. That was when the principal came and took over the class while the teacher was going to be out. She started right down the row of people reading and got to me, and she shamed me because I did not read as good as the other kids. I stumbled and muttered.

P: This was kindergarten?

G: I didn’t get kindergarten. My parents held me back because I had a two-years-younger sister than me. They didn’t want her to be home alone. So, they held me back. I didn’t get to have kindergarten -- I went right into first grade where the other kids had had kindergarten and were reading already. I had no idea what it was all about. Anyway, she shamed me and I hated her. Not only me, all the kids at school hated her.

P: What was her name? Do you remember?

G: Bella Perry.

P: Mrs. Perry?

G: I think she was a Miss. They [teachers] didn’t get married in those days. Bella Perry. I never heard anybody say a kind thing about her because she was such a gruff person.

Edie: What year did you start at Cooper?

G: Well, I graduated from the eighth grade in 1947. No, it couldn’t have been ‘47. I graduated from high school in ‘41.

P: So, it would be ‘37.

G: Yes, 1937. [She started at Youngstown about 1929.]

E: What was the school called then?

G: Youngstown. I had trouble getting through every class because of my reading problems. If you can’t read, you don’t absorb. It took me an extra year. I had to do, I think it was the fourth grade, over. Other than that, they just moved me on. I got great comfort and pride out of my sewing and choir and cooking lessons. Those were my favorites.

P: Do you remember what you sewed?

G: Oh, yes! The picture they keep repeating, the Cooper pages, there’s a picture of the graduating class. That was my graduating class -- ‘37. I sewed the dress that I was wearing there. [I learned to sew on a sewing machine.] All girls had to sew their own graduation dresses. And the boys got to have bought stuff.

[Group laughs]

E: You sound like you were a little bit envious.

G: Well, at the time I didn’t think of it. I was just happy to have somebody help me do that dress. The boys, that didn’t bother me. It wasn’t until later in life and you reflect, “How come?”

P: What did they do while you were taking sewing?

G: They had their shop. You know what that is?

P: They did wood construction.

G: Yes, they built things and used saws and stuff. {The school] considered one year of allowing [girls] to integrate but it didn’t work out. Nobody followed through on it.

I enjoyed gym and music; sewing and cooking were my favorites. Other than that, I just slid through the best I could.

E: What kinds of things did you do in gym class?

G: The usual. Playing games -- volleyball, learning the songs that they sang between that and music class. [Learned folk dancing, played games.] Between those, I learned songs that I still know today. I could memorize things but I couldn’t read them. What else do you want to know?

P: Tell me about how your family came to this area.

G: I was born in Kansas and two years after I was born, my sister was born. My father was a farmer and he was having trouble with the dry area -- sand and stuff in Kansas. The doctor told him if he didn’t move to a different climate, he wouldn’t last long. That put us -- father, mother, aunt and six kids -- in a car, and we drove out here. We ended up in Bremerton for a short period and then moved to [the] Seattle area. The Crown Hill area was our next move. Then we moved to West Seattle. I was there for the rest of my growing-up school years. Grade school and high school. We all got to graduate from those schools. I have very many fond memories of [Youngstown and West Seattle High School]. But I wish I had been a better student.

P: What did your father do once he got here?

G: He became a carpenter. [He also worked at Bethlehem Steel Company.] During the Depression, we would move from one house to another depending upon who needed work on their house.

P: You actually lived with people who...

G: Not with them, no. We moved in empty houses that were being vandalized. You know, anybody could find an empty house and take it over. They would move us into the house and, for the rent, my father would upgrade the house. We always had a little bit of dirt out in the yard. My dad always had his garden for vegetables. And his flowers. He was a flower person. We had the fruit trees in the backyard and all kinds of food would be growing in the yard. Then, he was a fisherman. He would get fish from the Sound and vegetables from the garden and flowers for the house. That’s how we survived.

My mother, on the other hand, she kept us clothed. People, knowing we had a large family, would give us the hand-me-downs. My mother would rip them up, wash the material, then cut out patterns and make our clothes for us. Between the two of them, we didn’t have any troubles through the Depression.

P: They were practically Homesteaders. Pretty self-sufficient.

G: Yes.

P: So, you lived in different houses around Delridge while you were going to Cooper?

G: Around the West Seattle area [clarifying].

P: Did you travel long distances to Cooper sometimes just to stay at the same school?

G: No, no. It was close. My first memories were there in Delridge. I guess I was three or four, something like that. From Delridge, we moved up on Avalon Way. From Avalon Way, that’s where we were living when I graduated from [Youngstown]. Moved on up the hill into West Seattle on Avalon Way until I was fourteen or fifteen. Then we moved up off of 35th, by the golf course up there, for a small period of time. My parent’s doctor -- Dr. Ida Hall -- her husband died. He was a doctor also. And she didn’t like living alone because they had a little girl. So, she talked my parents into giving up the life we had [on Avalon Way] and moving in with her. But here she was not used to six kids in a house. Not only six but her child, too. It just didn’t work out, so it was a short arrangement.

P: What order were you?

G: I was next to the baby. Between the only boy and the baby. That was a terrible position to be in [laughing].

P: Did your brother pick on you, is that why?

G: No, not really. But he got all the glory and all the attention. He was the Crown Prince.

My baby sister was the darling. So, here I was -- the forgotten one. I survived -- it made me stronger. I was able to take care of myself. Anyway, my favorite teacher was Miss [Jennie Jones]. I have her desk in storage. I’m hoping you guys will find a spot for it in your school [the renovated project].

P: I thought you said that the principal’s name was Perry?

G: No, no, no. Jennie Jones. What’s the matter with me [laughing at herself]?

E: Jennie Jones was the principal?

P: No, the teacher.

E: What was it about her that made her your favorite?

G: She always was kind. I never had to worry about being hurt by her. No matter what, she was kind. She helped me get through the awkward period. She was the only person who ever gave me undivided attention. I loved her for that. I moved on. I got married and had kids. And then I found out she was living right close to me. She had been retired and she was living close, down in Des Moines. I went to see her and she was blind. She remembered me and all, but she was blind and not well. First, she was in the retirement home and then she went to the nursing area. I continued to visit with her. And if she needed aspirin, I’d go get it. This kind of stuff. I’d do what I could for her. When she was in the nursing area, I would go see her. She’d say,

“Oh, please rub my feet.” “You don’t know how good that feels,” she would say.

Then, she had trouble with her dentures. I don’t know why -- I’ve had the same problem here -- the help don’t think about people with dentures, needing them cleaned. Needing them rinsed. Or needing them out at night. I got an infection in mine because I wasn’t getting the care here that I should have been. I have learned to ask for it.

“Will you please put my teeth in a [picking up a cup]?” I’m not having any more gum troubles. Anyway, I would do that for her and she appreciated it so much. When she first moved from the apartment to the nursing home, she had to get rid of so much. And I had already admired her desk. Oh, I’ve always wanted a desk like that. When she moved, she asked me, did I want it?

“Well, what do you think?” I said. “Of course!” And I’ve had it ever since. It’s been a treasure. I hope it will be carried on as something that was used in the school for many years. I also have a vase that she used. She told me this was the vase she used in school all the time for her flowers. When do you think [you] would be ready for taking something like that?

P: I think we could put it in the school anytime. And then we’d just have to move it out when we do the construction. Your daughter and I spoke about it, and I just need to figure out a way to go get it. So, when I get some time. I hope she’s not in a huge hurry.

G: She was asking, couldn’t I bring it here? Well, where would I put it?

E: What grade did Jennie Jones teach? Or what subject?

G: I think it was the seventh [or 8th grade]. Now, that’s why I wish I had my book [yearbook in storage]. Because all that is in there. [I left the photo album with Paul Fishburg.]

P: But it sounds like it was early. Your first year --

G: No, no. I think it was the seventh grade. Something like that. Right when I needed somebody to pay attention to me.

P: Can you talk about the neighborhood and what it was like around there then?

G: The kids were so different than today. So different.

P: In what way?

G: They had two parents at home. There was always somebody there to tell them what to do or look out for them. The kids, I know in our case, we were not allowed out of our own yard, without permission. “Can I go visit a certain person?”

“Fine. But be back at a certain time.”

And that was the rules that the kids in the neighborhood lived by. At least the ones that I knew. I didn’t know all of them because I didn’t get around. Like the kids that were allowed to run wild.

When we moved, there were the fruit trees still out there. And another family moved in that was there until she [the new owner] died a year or so ago. I asked her about the fruit trees. And she said, “Oh, I don’t have those anymore. I had them for many years but the neighbor kids were not watched.” They would steal the fruit as soon as it was edible. She never got any of it but she had the clean-up of the leaves and taking care of the trees. So, she just finally had them cut down. She lived alone, she wasn’t married. She lived alone and she wasn’t about to have all of that work on her shoulders and not get any fruit from it. So, she cut them down, which broke my heart.

P: There were a lot of orchards, right? That whole valley had a lot of orchards back then?

G: Yes. When we moved from that place [on Avalon Way] up to Admiral Way, there was all the woods behind us and we had sweet trees in there. Did you ever hear of the Boyson boys? The Boyson boys were devils.

P: That’s the building that Luna Park had been in [to Edie]. That’s the Boyson [place?]

G: [The Boysons had a store just north of us.] The fruits were between the store and us. And the boys would go in and take the fruit. When us kids would see them in there, we would run to Mom and say, “Mom, the kids are in the fruit!” She’d go out and yell at them.

Then she would tell my dad. Well, he wouldn’t do anything. “Oh, boys will be boys.”

We never got any satisfaction out of saving the fruit. Although, Mom always seemed to have enough to can. That was why we would get through our winters, by canning.

She was a hard worker.

P: Do you remember anything else about the neighborhood? The golf course wasn’t there yet, right?

G: No.

P: What was there? Was that just forest in there?

G: I really couldn’t tell you. I never got up into that area. They kept us close to home.

Oh, I am so sorry that they have dropped so much of the Christmas celebrations. It used to be so beautiful. That was the only real Christmas I ever had was there at school [and Sunday School].

P: Did your family not celebrate?

G: [Only a tree and gifts.] Oh, we had the Christmas tree. Each of us got a gift. And I always knew when my sister opened hers first -- that’s what I would have, too. I remember the umbrellas. She always got everything in blue and I always got everything in red. It was alright. But [my parents] could have handled it differently, in hindsight. The Christmas pageants -- all the kids were one or two generations from another country -- so, they still had some clothes and stuff from that country. And all the kids would put on their --

P: Native costumes?

G: Yeah, their costumes. And we would have a parade. Everybody in their own country’s clothes with a gift for the child to take onto the stage. It was so beautiful.

P: What countries?

G: Oh, dear. I don’t know. It was all of them!

P: Do you remember what nationalities were around? Were there a lot of Italians --?