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Part three of an interview with Matilda Koeller. Topics include: What it was like when her husband's mother died. His parents' involvement in politics, church, and social clubs. Work his family did on their house. Her husband's education, the work he did and his desire to fight in World War I. The social clubs Matilda and her husband belonged to. ; 1 MATILDA KOELLER: No, no. He did mostly home construction, repair work, you know. And Uncle Charlie worked. Uncle Al worked with him but they couldn't agree, so Al went on, on his own. DONALD KOELLER: And what was Uncle Al… he didn't become. he was a carpenter and remained a carpenter? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Yeah. He remained a carpenter, but one of his last projects was at the Chicago Filter Plant at the foot of Grand Avenue, that great, big filter plant there. Um, I think you can go through it, 'cause we went through it. He worked there and he made big money. DONALD KOELLER: So there were five children? MATILDA KOELLER: And he waved the check in front of Dad, you know, when Dad wasn't working and never gave him a cent. DONALD KOELLER: When you say "Dad". MATILDA KOELLER: My-my husband, your father. And-and, uh, Al was going to treat Dad to a state dinner and that never. DONALD KOELLER: Was that a close family? I mean. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, very, very close. Yeah, very, very. they all looked pre. DONALD KOELLER: But not very friendly though? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, that was, uh, that was. remember, when Al was 60 years old and, uh, he had his own family, but the family was very close. They-they looked out for one another very, very much. They were very close, uh, uh, that, that was taught by his mother. DONALD KOELLER: By Clara? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, by Clara. DONALD KOELLER: And you said earlier Clara died. MATILDA KOELLER: She died. She took sick and they rushed her to the hospital and within a week, she was dead. And it was a terrible blow, not 2 only to the family but to the neighbor, Mrs. Lawrence. She'd been. DONALD KOELLER: The Mrs. Lawrence that I knew, that we knew in here? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was a terrible big blow. DONALD KOELLER: Why? Was she especially liked in the neighborhood? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, she was well liked in the neighborhood, and Dad and Freda were out to Walton League during that Sunday night, you know. Anyway, she had so many. those days, you had the coffin in the house and they were afraid the house would cave in. There were so many people in there. You know, they were. DONALD KOELLER: In those days, the Koeller family in that neighborhood was popular. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. DONALD KOELLER: I mean, I remember differently as it… MATILDA KOELLER: Well, no. Well, see, that was a different class of people. Then it was mostly Swedes and Germans, see. And they all. well, of course, too, Clara belonged to a fraternity and they all came. That was her only relaxation, too, was this fraternity. They had a picnic there once a year. And that flock of people came to see her, plus the neighbors. DONALD KOELLER: So then Frederick Koeller went back to Germany to get his mother? MATILDA KOELLER: Mother. DONALD KOELLER: And she then finished the rearing of Walt. MATILDA KOELLER: No, she didn't. Walter at that time was 18 years old. Your father was then 18 years old. And it was a case of he had to learn to cook, or starve. He always said, "Because Dad was a very good cook." DONALD KOELLER: You mean he did the cooking at home? Who was home? You mean he cooked for his father? 3 MATILDA KOELLER: Well, he had. yeah. They all chipped in, cooking and washing clothes. And Freda got married. I don't know now whether Freda was married. Mae was married. Now, Freda, I think, got married and they lived in the home but they couldn't get along so they moved out. Then Walt was left alone. DONALD KOELLER: With Charlie? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, Charlie then, he left home because there was no room, you know, and he left the home. And then he came back. DONALD KOELLER: He left to join the service. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, he left to go to service, and I guess he didn't come back home. I know there was no family when Grossmother died. Then him and Frederick, Charlie and Frederick, lived together. DONALD KOELLER: In the old house. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, in the old house. And then when we got married, when Dad and I got married, Mae and your father and mother would always go home on Sunday and cook a nice meal. Charlie was then the cook and he used to make a good meal for the whole family. And then we chipped in a dollar each to help pay for the food, you know. But Charlie would make mashed potatoes and put in half a pound of butter. You know, he was a good cook. And fruit salad, boy, all the fruit that. you know, he would open cans and cans and then buy bananas and different kinds of fruits and it was. DONALD KOELLER: Let's go back, just a couple of general questions. Did Dad ever talk about. what was the church background to Frederick and Clara? Were they members? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, they were. Frederick was confirmed in the Lutheran faith. I got their marriage certificate. Now, whether Clara was confirmed in the Lutheran faith, that, I don't know. But the church that they were brought up moved on Fullerton and. well, I don't know. Fullerton and they somehow or another4 then went to [unintelligible - 00:07:09] Church. And there is where Walt was confirmed. I'm pretty sure there is where Walt was confirmed. DONALD KOELLER: Were they active in the church beyond attending in any way? MATILDA KOELLER: Uh, the parents, no, none. DONALD KOELLER: Somewhat like your family then where they send the kids. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. They sent the children there. DONALD KOELLER: Was Frederick and Clara at all involved in politics or in city activities or any.? MATILDA KOELLER: No, no. Dad Koeller. DONALD KOELLER: You said Clara was part of some kind of guild or. MATILDA KOELLER: No. Frederick never was, but Clara belonged to a fraternity. Now, which fraternity, I don't know. And they had summer picnics. And they used to decorate the members' graves. So evidently, that must have probably. the group that Clara belonged was all passed away. Whether it continued, that, I wouldn't know. DONALD KOELLER: Where are Clara and Frederick buried? MATILDA KOELLER: At Concordia Cemetery, but it is changed. The name is changed now. Too different, too different, and it's. I think the name now is Oak Forest or Forest Oak. And there is where I want to have the graves taken care of. DONALD KOELLER: They need perpetual care. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, perpetual care. DONALD KOELLER: Who else is buried there? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, there is Grossmother and Clara and Frederick and Uncle Charlie – four. And the four graves that are next to it is where Uncle Al and Maude and two babies of theirs, they were removed from a different grave and put in two graves on this lot. DONALD KOELLER: With Al and Maude. 5 MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. DONALD KOELLER: What can you tell me then now about Dad's childhood? It would be nice if Dad was here to answer all these but. MATILDA KOELLER: You mean, you mean. DONALD KOELLER: I mean, my father. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Well. DONALD KOELLER: He was the youngest of five. MATILDA KOELLER: Well, as much as I know. he was the youngest and him and his mother were very close. And he used to go to the store, do most of the grocery shopping. He became a very good meat buyer. You know, he knew all the meats. When we got married, he knew all the different cuts and he knew just what he was buying and always the good cuts of meat, you know. And he used to have to walk [unintelligible - 00:10:28]. There was the grocery store or a dry good and grocery store and he used to have to walk quite a distance to go to that store and do shopping. DONALD KOELLER: Did Dad ever talk about the time they moved to Race Avenue? Could he remember that experience? MATILDA KOELLER: No. If you want to know something about. Walt was the youngest and Al was the oldest. And they dug out. Grandpa, Frederick Koeller decided he was going to open a wood and coal shop. By that time, he had horses and wagon. That's why that garage was really a barn because that hayloft is where they kept the hay for the horses. DONALD KOELLER: The old garage? MATILDA KOELLER: The old garage. DONALD KOELLER: What we call the old garage? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. You remember those big two doors, you know. DONALD KOELLER: That was a big barn. 6 MATILDA KOELLER: Well, then they dug out the back part of the basement, and every Sunday, Dad's friends came in and worked and they put this. added on and dug out and I know that Al was just a kid and that's all they had to do was work, work, work, you know, because Dad was a real. DONALD KOELLER: And when you say "Dad," you mean Frederick? MATILDA KOELLER: Frederick, yeah. And Clara, Walter's mother, used to have to serve a big meal for all these workmen that came in because that's the way they did things those days. Friends helped friends. DONALD KOELLER: And that was when they built the back room, the kitchen, what we know as the kitchen. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, and the basement. Yeah, and they dug that all out, you know. And it was quite. not only hard for Al because he had. he didn't have freedom. He had to work hard. But also for your grandmother who have to do so much cooking. DONALD KOELLER: And then for youngest Walter, he was running around, bringing everybody water, huh. MATILDA KOELLER: I suppose. [Laughs] But I mean, you know, he did a lot of delivering the milk. All of that was before, see. They didn't have. DONALD KOELLER: So they gave up the cow and all that when they came to Race. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, yeah, gave up all that. DONALD KOELLER: Did he actually get a coal business then, too? MATILDA KOELLER: No, it never panned out. See, that's why they had the front entrance, and that was going to be, I guess, the office. It was that big room in the front. It never panned out to be a coal and wood. Then he evidently must have gotten a carpentry job or something or. it never panned out. DONALD KOELLER: Did Dad ever talk about special places they went or things they did in his 10, 11, 12-year-old time? 7 MATILDA KOELLER: Well, the only thing that I can remember is that they went to this fraternity that she belonged and they had a very good friend by the name of Sanders and visited back and forth. And the Sanders are buried down in the same cemetery, and I know that your father and I used to pass the Sanders' grave and it was sort of pathetic because the whole family was gone and nobody to take care of the graves. But they have stones on that. DONALD KOELLER: How did Dad describe himself when his mother died? You said he was very close to her. What was he, 16,17 at the time? MATILDA KOELLER: He was 18. DONALD KOELLER: Eighteen. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. He took it pretty hard and he always promised to. let's see. He promised his mother to take care of the finances for his father, see. And so, Dad's name was on his father's bank book and took care of all the finances because Dad bought notes, home notes and things like that. And of course, he lost practically all of that with the Depression. DONALD KOELLER: Dad was a very bright, young man. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, your father was, yeah, very. He knew finances and he always read finances. And another thing, you know, he used to read so much of the newspaper. I used to swear that he read it from front. from the beginning to the end because when we got married, you know, he sat there and read paper, and I wasn't interested so much in newspaper. I would sit there and maybe chat or something and he would sit there and first thing you know, I started crying because I felt I was neglected. The paper was more important than I was. That was the first year we were married, you know. DONALD KOELLER: Boy. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. 8 DONALD KOELLER: You should've hit him. MATILDA KOELLER: I should've, you know. But that was his way at home. Before he was married, he promised that. I think he promised his dad that he wouldn't. or he promised himself he wouldn't get married until Grossmother was passed away. DONALD KOELLER: I have a little problem now. Let's just check dates. You may not be able to do this. If Dad was born 1898 and was 18 when Clara died, that would mean she died in 1916. World War I started in 1914. MATILDA KOELLER: Oh, no, no, no. Clara died in 19. wait, 1916. Yeah, something like that. DONALD KOELLER: So then when he went to get Grossmother, World War I was going on then? Not the United States. I mean, Germany was fighting Great Britain. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Yeah. DONALD KOELLER: And the United States wasn't involved. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. DONALD KOELLER: So then there was risk that they would be sunk, depending on what kind of ship could get out of Germany. Well, that would be something that. who would know stuff like that? I mean, if you. I mean, who left. MATILDA KOELLER: There's nobody in the family that would know, except on the notes that dad has in the family tree on his side. Now, whether he has anything written there – because I kept saying to dad, "Get your family tree together, please," you know, and he just lacked ambition. And I said it to him. I said it to him between four and six months before he died. He used to sit by the front window and just do nothing, just sit. And I said to him, "Why don't you fix the family tree?" not thinking that he would die, just so that he would have something to do. 9 DONALD KOELLER: Or somebody could have come and sat with him with a tape recorder. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Yeah. DONALD KOELLER: But anyway, Dad's school, how far. as I recall, Dad did not go very far with schooling. MATILDA KOELLER: Well, Dad graduated. He went to college for two years. DONALD KOELLER: Oh, he finished high school? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Oh, yeah. DONALD KOELLER: And two years of. where did he go to school? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, what was that school on Milwaukee there? Carl Schurz, I think. I mean, Carl Schurz. well, you know. DONALD KOELLER: That was the high school? MATILDA KOELLER: That was the high school there. DONALD KOELLER: Can you see. do you know where he went to college, what college he went or what he studied? MATILDA KOELLER: I don't think he went. I'm sure he graduated from high school. But I know that he took up—what do you call it—economics, because he knew a lot about economics, so he must have taken that up some. other than high school, some college or some night school. DONALD KOELLER: What did Dad say or remember as his first job, you know, apart from working for his dad? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, the only thing that he used to talk a lot about. he was a salesman for a while. DONALD KOELLER: Yeah, I've heard him talk about that. Tell me about his job as a salesman. MATILDA KOELLER: Well, he got a job selling the rubber covers for the typewriters. Did he ever tell you that? DONALD KOELLER: Oh, yeah. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. And then he went to Indiana and… Dad was like. people took to dad. So he got into this office and I guess they 10 didn't want to be bothered with him but he says, "I'll let one of the girls try it in the office." And she liked it. I don't know. He sold everybody a set of those basically. DONALD KOELLER: What was the purpose of the rubber tip? MATILDA KOELLER: The rubber tip would be easier on the fingers and less noise on the typewriter, I think. DONALD KOELLER: So he traveled from office to office, peddling? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, peddling these and he. DONALD KOELLER: When would that have been? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, that would have been in the early '20s, the '20s or somewhere around there. DONALD KOELLER: Dad was too young to go to World War I. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. DONALD KOELLER: He was too young. MATILDA KOELLER: He was too. and they. DONALD KOELLER: Just barely, though, right? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. And they said, "Oh, you're underweight." So he went home and ate bananas, bananas and drank water, bananas and he didn't. he didn't gain an ounce. [Laughs] DONALD KOELLER: He did want to join. He did want to join. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, he did want to join. Yeah, he wanted to join. Because I guess living at home wasn't so, you know. with his mother gone. DONALD KOELLER: Well, it was a pretty glamorous war, the way they're describing it, a patriotic thing to do. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, yeah, it was a very patriotic thing. Because Oscar, you know, your uncle, he always regretted that he couldn't serve because he had to support his mother, you know. And he always felt a misfit. DONALD KOELLER: And the war was over then before Dad was old enough to.11 MATILDA KOELLER: To go. And he was. and in the second place, he was underweight. DONALD KOELLER: Under. yeah, he must have been because if he was. 1898, well then by 1918, he was 20. That was old enough to go. But he was underweight. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, but he was, but he was. DONALD KOELLER: Was he a healthy man, a healthy boy, or.? MATILDA KOELLER: No, he had a speech impediment. He had kind of a speech trouble. Because his mother didn't know that, you know, living with him until he was to talk at, I think, the graduation or something. Then she realized that he had an impediment in his speech and that held him back, too. DONALD KOELLER: But he overcame that. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, he overcame that. DONALD KOELLER: Do you know how? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Well, I suppose as. I think how he overcame it, probably joining the Walton League because he used to get up and talk and you can't. and he did stutter once in a while because I remember, you know. he didn't know me but I knew him. DONALD KOELLER: So you met Dad in the Walton League? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Well, he belonged to the Walton League and I belonged to the Walton League. DONALD KOELLER: And this is at Bethlehem Church? MATILDA KOELLER: No, this is at Christ Church. DONALD KOELLER: Christ Church. MATILDA KOELLER: But in those days, if you were a year. as much as a year younger, you were a shrimp. And that is why they had the Senior Walton League and then the Younger Walton League. DONALD KOELLER: Junior Walton League. 12 MATILDA KOELLER: Junior Walton League. See, I was three years younger than Dad. And by that time, Walt was well established in the Walton League. He went to conventions and he gave reports, and I used to be there at the meeting but he never knew me. DONALD KOELLER: So he was deeply involved in. MATILDA KOELLER: Very deeply involved in Walton League. Yeah. DONALD KOELLER: And the church in general? MATILDA KOELLER: And the church in general. But he. DONALD KOELLER: What kinds of things did the Walton League do in those days? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, they used to go on hikes and picnics and, of course, they had bunco then. DONALD KOELLER: Bunco. What's bunco? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. But then, you know, it got so out of hand, you know, that. from Saint Louis, it. DONALD KOELLER: What was bunco? MATILDA KOELLER: Bunco was playing with dice. Bunco was playing with dice and you know, and. well, the first dice was thrown, then you were to work on that one. you know, if one was thrown, then you had your two dice and you throw it. Well, if you didn't get a one, then the next party would try. And whoever got a three once, that would be bunco. DONALD KOELLER: And what would that do for you? MATILDA KOELLER: That means that whoever. your partner would get a mark on their tally, see, and if you threw three twos or three threes or something, that would be counted as five. And whoever got 23 first. your partner and you got 23, then that would be the end of that game, of that until. you would play maybe an hour and a half. Then they would give a prize. But it got so out of hand, that that's all they wanted to do, was play bunco. DONALD KOELLER: This was the young people? MATILDA KOELLER: This was the young people. 13 DONALD KOELLER: These weren't the old folks like… MATILDA KOELLER: No, no. DONALD KOELLER: This was the young people come together and have a good day. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, yeah. And we raised money, a little money, that way. For what, I don't know, you know. DONALD KOELLER: Then all of a sudden, the church. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, the church started to put a clamp on it and then of course, eventually, it. because we used to. it wasn't only done down at church. We'd hire a big hall. DONALD KOELLER: This was the Walton League? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, this was the Walton League. DONALD KOELLER: [Laughs]. Did you have dances? MATILDA KOELLER: No. No dancing. DONALD KOELLER: Why not? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, why not? [Laughs] Because your body and his body would be up against and that was temptation. DONALD KOELLER: Oh, I remember. Of course, I remember. MATILDA KOELLER: Of course, now, [Luz] Church. They had a dance in Luz Church And she wrote and she says, "Just think: What we couldn't do, we're doing now." [Laughs] DONALD KOELLER: "Letting our kids get away with." But when you went to Walton League, you went to these bunco things or the picnics and. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, yeah. But that was. I belonged to Talitha Club. DONALD KOELLER: The what? MATILDA KOELLER: I didn't go too much to Walton League because I was. not that I want to make myself younger than what I. but I never was taken for my age. I was always taken. and once I worked with the Revere Electric and I. the fellow, he fell for me. And when I told him. actually, he tried to guess my age and keep going down. I was then going with your Dad and I was 25 and 14 he says, "Well, I'll start out with 22, and 21, 20." Then he went back to 22 again and 23. And he said, "Well, you're not that old, you know." He says, "You're older than 18." I was actually 25 and he wouldn't believe me. So you can imagine when I was 18 that I probably looked like 15, and so. DONALD KOELLER: But the Walton League then really was for people in their young 20s. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, yeah. DONALD KOELLER: Well, what was the Talitha Club? MATILDA KOELLER: Talitha was a girls' club of sewing, where we would get together and sew every other week. And then, of course, then later on, too, they got into the bunco business. So between the Walton League and that, it was just way out of hand, you know. DONALD KOELLER: And this was in the early '20s? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, this was. DONALD KOELLER: What job did Dad have when you first met? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, Dad had this job of transporting automobiles from Janesville to Chicago. He had what you would call a trailer./AT/mb/ee

Part one of an interview with Matilda Koeller. Topics include: Why her parents left Germany and came to the U.S. Her father's work as a barber. How her parents met and were married. Her parents had 13 children, only ten survived to adulthood. Her ear troubles as a result from having scarlet fever as a child. When her parents got a house with a bathroom for the first time. Her work making coffee for teachers at school. ; 1 MATILDA KOELLER: Parents made children go to work and help support the family. My mother, uh, after she was born, her dad – DONALD KOELLER: Before you come back to your mother, let's. why did, why did, uh, your father. that was the [Sigwart] family. MATILDA KOELLER: Uh, no. My father was the Sigwart family. DONALD KOELLER: Why did they leave Germany? Why did they come to America and to Fitchburg? Do you know? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, I never found, really found out why my father's, uh, parents moved to Germany, except I suppose to make a better living. DONALD KOELLER: And in Fitchburg he then was a shoemaker? MATILDA KOELLER: Uh, yes. He had his own, uh, establishment or [unintelligible - 00:00:48]. We don't know much about Dad except that, uh, he had to help, uh, with the shoemaking business. DONALD KOELLER: Is that a shoemaking or shoe repair? MATILDA KOELLER: No, the shoemaking. DONALD KOELLER: And did. that would be your grandfather, did he die in Fitchburg or did he move.? MATILDA KOELLER: No. Grandpa Sigwart was buried and, um, um. I can't remember any Catholic cemetery in Chicago. But his mother was buried in Concordia, uh, Cemetery in River Park, a suburb of Chicago. DONALD KOELLER: What was her maiden name? MATILDA KOELLER: Her name. well, really her name is on the recording in paper that I sent each of the boys. DONALD KOELLER: You can't remember it now? MATILDA KOELLER: I can't remember her name, no. DONALD KOELLER: What was. your dad's name was Jacob. MATILDA KOELLER: Jacob. Yeah. DONALD KOELLER: His father's name was? 2 MATILDA KOELLER: Um. now, that's another thing I can't remember. But there. his, his mother. there was some. uh, or somebody was made a-a widow or a widower and his, um, mother remarried or it must have been his father because they all carried the name of Sigwart because Louis and [Pink] were his stepsister and brother. DONALD KOELLER: Did this whole family live in Fitchburg and then moved west? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, they were. the whole family moved to Chicago. DONALD KOELLER: Do you know. when was that? Do you know? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, it must have been when Dad was 20 years old because that's when he met my mother and [unintelligible - 00:03:16]. DONALD KOELLER: And they courted here in Chicago? MATILDA KOELLER: And they courted here in Chicago and were married. DONALD KOELLER: Tell me about. you said your grandfather. I mean, your father, Jacob Sigwart, he did not have much of an education. MATILDA KOELLER: He had no education. In fact, when his oldest daughter was going to school, which was Lily Anne, they wanted him to study along with his oldest daughter but he was ashamed to know that he couldn't read or write. DONALD KOELLER: What did he do for a living? MATILDA KOELLER: He became a barber. DONALD KOELLER: Did he have any – I mean, was he a barber all his life? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, he was a barber. When he came to Chicago, he evidently went to barber school and learned the trade of being barber because that way he didn't have to have any kind of an education. And I know that I asked my mother, "Mother, how come that you married Dad when he couldn't read or write? You know, after all, you had a great education." And she said he used to take the newspaper and he would look and like probably pretend he could read but must have looked at just a picture and got an idea what was going on through the 3 conversations of the customers that came in to have their hair cut. And at those days, the barbers had a bathtub so that the men come in and took a bath because those days they didn't have no bathtubs. DONALD KOELLER: At home? MATILDA KOELLER: At home. And they would come in for a shave and a haircut and a bath. DONALD KOELLER: Did he speak German? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Mother and Dad didn't. they always knew how to talk German but they never talked German at home because my mother worked for a wealthy family when she came to Chicago when she was 14 years old. And he came to work for some wealthy family which I. if I remember correctly was the [unintelligible - 00:05:51] family. And they would not let her talk German. They said, "You come to America. Now, talk English." DONALD KOELLER: You say your mother came to Chicago when she was 14? MATILDA KOELLER: Fourteen, after she graduated and was confirmed because there was no work for a farmer's daughter in a small town. DONALD KOELLER: [Unintelligible - 00:06:15]. MATILDA KOELLER: No, they had moved them. By that time, they had moved to Loganville, Wisconsin, and they got this farm, 160 acres, from the government if they would work it. So the farm was theirs after a certain amount of years. DONALD KOELLER: How many brothers and sisters did you have? MATILDA KOELLER: Anna. there were 12 in the family, and mother. Anna was the second from the oldest. DONALD KOELLER: So the homestead then was Loganville. MATILDA KOELLER: Was Loganville. DONALD KOELLER: [Unintelligible - 00:06:57]. 4 MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. It's still [unintelligible - 00:06:59] when they. when he gave up farming. When he was I think 72 years old, they sold the farm. DONALD KOELLER: But the family is still in the Loganville area? MATILDA KOELLER: But the family. yeah, the family all dispersed, you know, close by except the oldest son who went to Fargo, North Dakota. DONALD KOELLER: Anna came to Chicago. MATILDA KOELLER: To Chicago. And then when. DONALD KOELLER: She went to the [Fitchburg] home as a live-in maid. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, as a live-in – I'm almost sure as a live-in maid. That I cannot say for sure. DONALD KOELLER: Is that where she learned to be a seamstress? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, she must have learned it at home, because being the oldest daughter in the family and so many children that followed, they choose to make their underwear like bloomers and they wore what they called garter belt. It was just a form over their top and then the garters were fastened to hold up their stockings. In those days, they wore nothing but black stockings. So she used to send made clothes and send home money. And then when Bertha, who was the second oldest daughter, when she graduated and was confirmed, she came to Chicago also. And now, I don't know just what Anne's purpose is, but they were both good teachers. DONALD KOELLER: Let's see. When she was 14, I would have been about a year. MATILDA KOELLER: Well, the dates are all on there. DONALD KOELLER: You have that on there. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Well, I've got their dates of birth and the date of their deaths, but when they moved to Chicago, you would have to figure that out, 14 years. Because they went to a one-room 5 schoolhouse, which was connected with the church, the minister was the teacher and their minister. DONALD KOELLER: This is in Loganville? MATILDA KOELLER: This is in Loganville. DONALD KOELLER: Tell me a little bit about the Sigwart and [Forrest] family relationship with the church? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, Dad Sigwart was originally a Catholic but when he married my mother, Anna, Dad said, "You're with the children all the time. You bring them up Lutheran." And that's how we all became Lutherans. And then when Dad was about 50 years old, he got blood poisoning in a finger and I guess in order to save his arm, they amputated his finger. And I remember him walking, pacing the floor and crying, just thinking he could not earn a living anymore because he's losing his main finger that he would use with the scissors. But eventually, he practiced so much that he went back into the barber business and opened his own shop because he was past 45 and they wouldn't hire anymore old men. And that's how Dad opened his own business. And when he made it good at the barber shop, then always somebody else would come along and make a barber shop which may be a block or block and a half away and, of course, then the people would go there and there was not enough trade for two barbers, so he would move to find another good spot. And that happened to him twice that I remember. DONALD KOELLER: Did the family move then also? MATILDA KOELLER: No, the family. he had a business a half a block away from where we lived. So he could come home for dinner. And then I remember one place that he had opened that was just maybe around the corner, a block, you know, maybe a block and a half. 6 DONALD KOELLER: Let's go back then. let's talk about when Jacob Sigwart and Anna [Forrest] met. How did they meet and how did their courtship go? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, I don't know where they met but I suppose, you know. I don't know how they met but I often asked. you know, I said to Dad one time, "Why did you marry mother?" And he said, "Because she was so beautiful." She was a beautiful person and had lovely hair and rosy cheeks. DONALD KOELLER: Did they court long or. do you know anything about their courtship? MATILDA KOELLER: I really don't know how long they courted. DONALD KOELLER: And they were married in a Lutheran church in Chicago. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. They were married. at that time, all the Germans flocked in this one neighborhood. DONALD KOELLER: Where was that? MATILDA KOELLER: And that was what they called. Goose Island is where Mother and Dad must have met. Of course now, Goose Island is all factories, all of it. DONALD KOELLER: Except for along the eastern part of the river. [Unintelligible - 00:13:30] MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Yeah. And then they were. the church was First Bethlehem which was located on Paulina and Hoyne, which was not too far from Goose Island. And all the German people flocked in that neighborhood and went to church there and were married. DONALD KOELLER: The First Bethlehem couldn't have been Paulina and Hoyne. MATILDA KOELLER: Paulina and. well, it's on Paulina. DONALD KOELLER: Farther north, somewhere there. MATILDA KOELLER: Let's see now. Paulina is one way. LeMoyne maybe – DONALD KOELLER: Lemoyne. That must've been the one. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, LeMoyne. 7 DONALD KOELLER: LeMoyne and Paulina run parallel. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. There is where the Koellers were married. The Koellers, the Walters, you know. My husband. well, let's see what I think. Grandpa, Frederick Koeller, and Clara were married in the same church because they came over. DONALD KOELLER: We'll get that side of the family a little later. Do you remember your mother and father ever talking about the wedding in the church or the reception or what kind of wedding they had? MATILDA KOELLER: No, they. my mother was married in brown. I don't know whether she made her own dress which I imagine she did. She had a white veil and you have a picture of that, too. I sent that to you. DONALD KOELLER: Well, that's going to be fun, to put pictures and your records thing together with this. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Oh, they were married. Now, whether they had any kind. I don't imagine they had any kind of a reception because those days they probably just went to church because most everybody's gotten married in church in those days. DONALD KOELLER: But at the time, was Anna living. where was Anna living prior to when she was married to your father? MATILDA KOELLER: You know, I never. you know, that part I never asked Mother, only that she worked with these wealthy people and every Friday was silver day. They spent all day Friday cleaning silverware so you know they were wealthy people. But I suppose they didn't get much pay either. DONALD KOELLER: Do you know where they lived or what their circumstances once they got married? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, once they got married, I really don't know where they lived but I knew that when I was 4 or 5 years old, we lived close to First Bethlehem and the street names are all changed. 8 But Aunt Lil knows the address of the house and it's still standing, 800 or something. DONALD KOELLER: So they got married. How long was it before they started a family? MATILDA KOELLER: Within a year. DONALD KOELLER: And that was Lily Anne. MATILDA KOELLER: That was Lily Anne. Lily Anne was the oldest, yeah. DONALD KOELLER: And then altogether there were 10? MATILDA KOELLER: Ten living children, three died before they were married. So mother had 13 children altogether. DONALD KOELLER: And you were number.? MATILDA KOELLER: I think I was number six or seven. I was in the middle. DONALD KOELLER: Tell me now what you can remember about a couple of things about your childhood? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, when I was two and a half, Grandma Forrest came to Chicago because there was an outbreak of hysteria or scarlet fever and oranges were very, very scarce. And mother always talked about Ruth being delirious and crawling under the bed looking for an orange because that seems to be one of the remedies. or not remedy but was something new. Oranges were something new at that time. And I was two and a half years old and I had it so bad that they carried me around in a pillow and I didn't eat for a whole month. And from the medicine, I got scars on my lips and Grandma Forrest prayed that I would die because I was so sick that there was nothing to me. I lost all my hair but some of my. DONALD KOELLER: The doctors couldn't do anything? MATILDA KOELLER: Well. DONALD KOELLER: What kind of doctoring was there? That would have been 1923, 1924? 9 MATILDA KOELLER: Well, there wasn't enough doctoring. They quarantined you. They couldn't even get a nurse and people wouldn't go near. DONALD KOELLER: Your Dad couldn't come home? [Unintelligible - 00:19:32] MATILDA KOELLER: No. And I think that Dad probably stayed home and took care or helped take care of us because there were five of us, I think. There was little Henry, and Ruth was very bad, and I was bad as well, and Margaret. So evidently, dad must have stayed home, had to stay home to take care because we were quarantined. You couldn't get anybody to come near us. DONALD KOELLER: Grandma Forrest came down to Loganville to help out. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. She came down to help us. DONALD KOELLER: That must have been very difficult. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. It was. and there were a lot of people that died because they didn't have no antibiotics then. DONALD KOELLER: Do you ever remember going to the doctor's office? [Unintelligible - 00:20:33] MATILDA KOELLER: Oh, yes, plenty, [laughs] plenty for my ear. From the scarlet fever, I got trouble with my ear. DONALD KOELLER: Do you want some coffee? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, we might just as well have the rest of the coffee. DONALD KOELLER: Go ahead. MATILDA KOELLER: Well, I had a running ear from the scarlet fever and of course the parents being poor, Dad only making $7 a week. well, I got coffee in there… yeah, just the water. The doctors would…so I went to a clinic, to an eye, ear, nose, and throat clinic. On Wednesday, Dad didn't work. That was his day off, and he would take me to this clinic. The clinic didn't seem – I don't remember too much about it, except squirting a lot of water in my ear to clear out the decaying bone that was forming. But when I was 23 years old, I got hold of an ear specialist and he said, "Absolutely no water," and he used this 10 x-ray in my ear for less than a minute to see, I think only two times. And with the medicine that he had, cleared up this running ear, which in my whole 20… in my years, I had syringed it and I was doing more harm to it than good. And, of course, time came in with medicine and dried out the decayed bone that was pretty well gone. DONALD KOELLER: The doctor just kept draining and. MATILDA KOELLER: Draining and. DONALD KOELLER: In all your teenage years. MATILDA KOELLER: And it had a terrible odor that before I had a date with a fellow, that was the very last thing I would do, was syringe it to clear it out, but before the evening [was], it was drippy, draining on me. It was terrible. DONALD KOELLER: [Unintelligible - 00:23:46]. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. It was really something, you know. DONALD KOELLER: Where did you go to school? MATILDA KOELLER: I went to. first, I went to [Perse] School near the church, near Paulina and I went. I was in first grade. I was only five years old. And one week or day, some boy rolled a snowball, rolled it in water, in melted snow and threw it and it landed right on my ear and I fainted. So they carried me in my sister's room and her girlfriend carried me into the room and there I had my head on the desk, I guess, half of the day. But I was plagued with earaches and headaches up until I was about. Well, every week, I had either a headache or an earache. DONALD KOELLER: Let's go back and talk more about the home and marriage of Jacob and Anna. MATILDA KOELLER: Well, when we lived around [Perse] School, nobody had bathrooms. You had your toilet in the hallway. And I still. DONALD KOELLER: This was a multifamily house. 11 MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Yeah. There were either two or four in the – I think in this place, it was four. DONALD KOELLER: Front and back and one upper story? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Yeah. And we had a [unintelligible - 00:25:45], the toilets were, and there was no bath. But when. Dad, being a barber and seeing all these men coming home, you know, coming into the barber shop and needed a bath, so when he moved from around Paulina, he insisted about having a bathroom because then they were building the bathrooms in the house. DONALD KOELLER: This would be, say, 1910 or so? MATILDA KOELLER: This is. no, when I was 6 years old, in 1907. And we did. It must have been a bedroom because it was a big bathroom and a big tub. And from then on, we always had a bathroom, a bathtub and a toilet. Not a washstand, but just a bathtub and a toilet. That's one thing my father insisted upon, whenever we moved, was the bathroom. DONALD KOELLER: At that point in that house, there was electric light? MATILDA KOELLER: No. There was kerosene lamps then. We had kerosene lamps then. DONALD KOELLER: On the wall of the room? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, all I can remember is carrying the kerosene lamp, especially going to the bedroom. When we moved from there, we moved about two blocks away, above a grocery store, and then we had kerosene lamps. DONALD KOELLER: Do you remember getting electricity when you were still there? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, I think the first electricity was on Salem because I don't remember cleaning lamps there. DONALD KOELLER: How old were you when you moved to Salem? MATILDA KOELLER: I was about 13, 12 or 13 years old, when I moved to Salem because I went out of the district, the school. In those days, 12 you had to go to a school in your neighborhood. That was the law. But because my sister, Margaret, made coffee for the teachers and she had graduated in February, they asked me to take over the job of making coffee, and so I got a special permit to go out of the district to [drive] to school, you know, for the last year and a half of my schooling. And I made 10 cents a day. I think about a dollar a week they gave me for the. I used to get out of school at lunchtime, a half hour early, and made coffee for the school teachers. I carried my lunch because I was out of the district. I couldn't go home to eat. It's a little bit too far to walk. That was a. you had to go in your district. For instance, my brother, Ed, who was the next youngest, next to me, he only had a half a year of schooling to graduate and they wouldn't let him finish there. He had to go to the school in his district where Mother and Dad moved. But then he would have to start the whole eighth grade over and then he thought he wouldn't go to school anymore. So he. DONALD KOELLER: He never finished the eighth grade? MATILDA KOELLER: He never finished, never graduated because he wasn't going to take that half a year over again. DONALD KOELLER: But of the 10 children, brothers and sisters, almost all of your brothers and sisters finished? MATILDA KOELLER: No. Henry didn't, the second from the oldest. He did not finish. And then Ed did not finish./AT/mb/ee

Part five of an interview with Matilda Koeller. Topics include: What it was like for Matilda to have her first child. Her husband's work and the different places they lived. What it was like when he was unemployed after the start of the Great Depression. ; 1 DONALD KOELLER: Tell me about Wally's birth. Did you have to rush to the hospital or.? Tell me about Wally's. MATILDA KOELLER: No, no. Waller, uh, uh. well, Waller's birth was, you know. uh, Dr., uh, Ballingers, you know, he-he had office hours twice a-a day in the afternoon and the evening. And so he said, "Well, when you get signs, go to the hospital." So I called them up and, uh, he rushed to the hospital and I wasn't even there. [Laughs] I couldn't make my. DONALD KOELLER: What hospital was that? MATILDA KOELLER: Lutheran Deaconess Hospital where all three of you were born. That building is torn down. That hospital is torn down now. DONALD KOELLER: Where was that? That was. MATILDA KOELLER: That was right there on, uh, around, uh, Hoyne and, uh. DONALD KOELLER: Leavitt? Or Walton and. yeah. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, yeah, near Saint Mary's. See, that, uh. the price. well, the Catholics wanted that, wanted that, uh, space because, uh, they were getting I don't know how many millions of dollars from the government to build a new, uh, a-a new hospital to Saint Mary's, see. And so, uh, a lot of the, especially Ester Strube was disappointed because she has donated money to the Lutheran Deaconess Hospital and she gave, I don't know, 2000 hours of free service. And, uh, all of a sudden, uh, it was, "No, don't sell it." And then all of a sudden, just from under their feet, it was sold and then it was. the money was given to the Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge. So that's the outcome of. DONALD KOELLER: What was it like for you to have a baby? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, it was. in first place, I-I was, uh. well, uh, I didn't want to go outside. You know, I was more or less, uh, ashamed of being big. I was big. And, uh, uh, I didn't have money, uh, you know. Uh, I didn't have, uh, uh, maternity dresses like 2 they have today. And I know I didn't go to church. I didn't want to be seen as, you know. so I stuck close to the house and just went shopping. DONALD KOELLER: What kind of medical prenatal or.? MATILDA KOELLER: I had none. When I was five and a half months, I went to the doctor for the first time. I felt like. and to show you how [laughs] I must have been awful dumb. But anyway, I wasn't dumb but I was backward bashful and Ballinger said to me, "Well, now what can I do for you?" And I said, "Well, I think I'm pregnant." [Laughs] He said, "You think?" [Laughs] And I already felt like. DONALD KOELLER: [Laughs] MATILDA KOELLER: I didn't go to the doctor like they do today because it was a natural thing in those days just to have a doctor and if something. you needed attention. But I didn't go to the doctor, I think, maybe two or three times before Waller was born. And I did that with all three of you boys. DONALD KOELLER: How was Dad taking to the idea of family way? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, Dad went to. see, how did I get to the hospital? So we had a car then, you know, Charlie's car. So he drove. DONALD KOELLER: He went back to Race to get the car? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Well, yeah, Charlie let us have the car. So I didn't go to the hospital until the next morning or in the evening because doctor was there and I wasn't there, you know. But I had more or less a false alarm, and Waller took about two days. Now, with you, at first he said to Walt, "You can have the car when it's ready." And when I got in the car, my water broke. And I felt bad about that, that the car was wet, but he didn't, you know. And that's when the doctor. the intern then worked on me and – I don't know. Did I tell you what happened? DONALD KOELLER: No. 3 MATILDA KOELLER: Well, see, the intern worked on me while the doctor had his office hours from 7:00 to 8:00. And when he came in, this intern was pressing hard and I was in terrible agony and my head was laying over the table way back and I saw Dr. Ballinger coming in and I said, "Oh, Dr. Ballinger." Then he said to the intern, "Stop!" And he, the intern, somehow or another, injured your head. But when you were born, you were a beautiful baby and I nursed right away. They couldn't get over how I could nurse a baby. Generally, it took a day but I nursed you right away. But the next day, they never gave me you. And I wondered and wondered and I was filling up, and then they held you away from me a whole day. But in the meantime, Dad, you know, of course got a hold of Mildred and said, "Oh, we got such a beautiful baby. Oh, is he beautiful." You know, and of course, she came to the hospital and then you were in a separate compartment away from all the other babies. And when the nurse brought you to the window, Dad and Mildred nearly [unintelligible - 00:07:18], you know, couldn't. they were shocked because your head was in a point, see. Because see, the intern had. DONALD KOELLER: Compressing? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, yeah, see. DONALD KOELLER: How long did my head remain a point? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, the next day, it went back into normal. [Laughs] But that was serious. DONALD KOELLER: I'm not pointed now. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. But I mean, that was really serious because you. DONALD KOELLER: What did they tell you? MATILDA KOELLER: They didn't tell me nothing. DONALD KOELLER: And what did you think? 4 MATILDA KOELLER: You know, and I said, "Where is my baby?" And well, it never dawned upon me that there was something wrong with the baby, you know. It never dawned upon me. DONALD KOELLER: So then Dad came in and told you? MATILDA KOELLER: No. Then the next day. I first found out the next day. DONALD KOELLER: Well, after Dad saw me, what did he do? He did not come to visit you then? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, he came, you know, Mildred and… but they kept everything from me. They didn't say a word, you know, because they didn't want me to worry about it, I suppose. And then when Ralph was born, I said to Ballinger, I says, "I don't want nobody to touch me but you." He said, "Don't worry. Nobody will." And so he was concerned, too. DONALD KOELLER: Well, was Ralph's birth then.? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. DONALD KOELLER: Nothing unusual? MATILDA KOELLER: No. It was just very natural. I never. the only thing I remember – I mean, I never – I did make noise when the intern was trying to rush the job, because I was in real pain. But other than that, the nurse, when Ralph was born said, "Let me know when you get a pain. I don't know when you get a pain." So I was able to contain myself without even a slight sign of pain. DONALD KOELLER: How did you pick the names Walter, Donald, and Ralph? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, Walter I really. Walter was named after his father. And I like the name of Ralph and when the doctor said, "What are you naming.?" Because we always called Dr. Ballinger, and he said, "What are you going to name this boy?" And we said, "Ralph." I mean, Donald, see. And there were three babies baptized in Christ Church by the name of Donald, one after another. Reverend Hurdle said, "What happened? What's this name about Donald?" 5 DONALD KOELLER: But there's nobody in the family named Donald? MATILDA KOELLER: Oh, yeah. I like the name of Donald. I have a cousin by the name of Donald. And I had Donald. DONALD KOELLER: Which cousin? MATILDA KOELLER: That's up in… well, he died about the same time Mildred did. He was a shorthand teacher in college in Whitewater. DONALD KOELLER: But he was part of the Logan [Court]. MATILDA KOELLER: He was part of the Courts. His name was Donald Court. He was. Henry Courts was one of Anna. DONALD KOELLER: Anna's brother. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, brother. And he was electrocuted. He worked for electrical concern up there and he climbed. that was when electricity was pretty young, you know. And he climbed up the ladder and touched the wrong wire and was electrocuted. DONALD KOELLER: Where did the name. and then Albert came? MATILDA KOELLER: Albert came. I imagine, Albert came through Albert Stockholm. I really. you know. DONALD KOELLER: And Walter's middle name was Henry. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. They came from Henry. DONALD KOELLER: From your brother. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, my brother – and also the uncle. DONALD KOELLER: What about Adolf? Was Wally always.? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, Adolf came from Dad's side of the family. DONALD KOELLER: Where? I don't ever recall. MATILDA KOELLER: Well, I think. let's see. Adolf, I think, originated. there are some Adolf in the Koeller family. Maybe Frederick has Adolf in it. DONALD KOELLER: And Ralph? MATILDA KOELLER: And then Ralph, I like the name of Ralph. And Dr. Ballinger said. and I said, "Well, I like the name of Ralph." He said, "Well, that's my name." That was his name. 6 DONALD KOELLER: Ralph Ballinger, the doctor. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, see. But I didn't. DONALD KOELLER: But there was nobody in the family. MATILDA KOELLER: No, nobody in the family. But we didn't pick. you know, we didn't pick anybody's name in the family. I wasn't crazy about the name of Albert, so we gave it as, you know. DONALD KOELLER: A middle name. MATILDA KOELLER: A middle name. Yeah. DONALD KOELLER: What about Carl? Who is. for Ralph Carl? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, Carl was a short name of Charles, see. Evidently, you know. because I didn't do all the picking. DONALD KOELLER: No, no. MATILDA KOELLER: See. And we didn't want to be all one-sided, you know, on my side of the family only, you know although Walter's. DONALD KOELLER: Well, Henry was on your side. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, Henry. But I always liked the name of Henry. And I understand, I think Margaret's father's name, I think, is Henry. Because they asked. in a letter, they asked names, you know. I said, "Well, you know, I want [laughs] I wanted somebody be named Jacob after my father." [Laughs] DONALD KOELLER: Not a chance mom, not a chance. [Laughs] I don't think Cathy will ever name her. When the babies were being born, during that period of time, then you bought the house, the bungalow. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, we bought the house when. we bought the house before you were born. I was expecting then. And Mae and Albert and Evelyn lived with us for a whole year. DONALD KOELLER: In the house – in the bungalow? MATILDA KOELLER: In the bungalow, yeah. DONALD KOELLER: Was that Mae and.7 MATILDA KOELLER: Mae, the kid sister, and brother-in-law, which was a traveling salesman. He only came home about every six weeks. And Evelyn was going to high school then. DONALD KOELLER: Evelyn.? MATILDA KOELLER: Evelyn [Stockholm]. Evelyn. DONALD KOELLER: Was their daughter. MATILDA KOELLER: Was their daughter, yeah. DONALD KOELLER: Tell me about the house. I mean, it wasn't a two-family house though, was it? MATILDA KOELLER: No, no, it was. DONALD KOELLER: With a single kitchen. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. But she. it had a great big. we had two bedrooms and then an extra porch, an enclosed porch. They had two porches, one was enclosed and one was open. But that only lasted a year. DONALD KOELLER: Was that a shared purchase or.? MATILDA KOELLER: No, no. DONALD KOELLER: You owned it? MATILDA KOELLER: No, no. We owned it, but Mae. you know, the rents were going up, you know, and she was looking for property – and I don't know how it was. Because Mae, we were getting along fine with Mae. There was no reason why we couldn't make it go all this… DONALD KOELLER: So it was just – I mean, that made it. you got rent from them which helped to pay for the.? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. We got expenses from, you know, rent, but it was very little, you know. But see, we didn't. we bought the house and we were not in it when your father was laid off for 12 weeks. So we knew at that time. anyway, I felt at that time that we wouldn't be able to hang on to it because we lost the $500 cushion that we had in the bank because the bank closed. 8 DONALD KOELLER: This was. you moved in the house in '31. MATILDA KOELLER: We moved in the house in '31. See, we were married in '28. No, I think we moved in '30. But see, the way the house had to be paid was every five years, you had to renew the contract, see, and that would cost $500. See, it's different than today. You can buy a house and put $2,000 down and then pay every month and there was just that bill to pay enough at the end of five years. You see, that was. well, when there was no money coming in for 12 weeks, then the little that we had and what we got from Mae survived us. And then, of course, he worked but then he had to take a terrible cut, and then we were allowed to stay in the house for a certain length of time, I don't know, was it two years before we moved, but we had to move. DONALD KOELLER: So you were evicted? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. DONALD KOELLER: Where was the house? MATILDA KOELLER: It was on Merrimac. DONALD KOELLER: Do you remember the number? MATILDA KOELLER: It was between Belden and Addison, Addison and Belden. DONALD KOELLER: And what did you pay for it? I mean, how much.? MATILDA KOELLER: Seven thousand two hundred dollars for a brand new house, brick. DONALD KOELLER: And you had to put $500 down? MATILDA KOELLER: No, we put more. We put in $1,200. Well, then we got up there, but in winter, it was colder than blue blazes and I had to learn how to make a fire on a little stove and also on the kitchen top stove. No, no, that. the heat from the basement, from her flat kind of warmed up but there was no storm windows and it wasn't insulated. You know, it was an attic flat with living room. two bedrooms and a living room and a dining room and a kitchen. It was a big attic but it was cold so 9 that we had to. what Dad and I did, we draped a blanket in between the living room and the dining room because we didn't have money for coal you know. And it was nice up there and always been, the place, but we could only stay there a year because Walt lost his job then. DONALD KOELLER: Let's go back when Dad was working at Wilson and you bought the house. So before you even moved in, he was laid off from work. MATILDA KOELLER: No, he was laid off for 12 weeks. Yeah. DONALD KOELLER: For 12 weeks. Why was there a layoff at Wilson's? MATILDA KOELLER: Well, I don t know why. I think the place just wasn't. I don't know. They were all laid off, I think, for 12 weeks. Anyway, he was laid off and I think Paul was laid off, too. DONALD KOELLER: But then after 12 weeks, he went back. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, he went back and. DONALD KOELLER: With a cut in wages? MATILDA KOELLER: With a cut in wages. DONALD KOELLER: Well, that would have all been tied to the overall Depression that was going on. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. Because the Depression was. see, because then, you know, while we were living on Eddy Street, Pastor Hurdle came to visit, you know, he came to do his visit. And I started to cry because Walt was working until 9, 10, 11 o'clock at night. And this was during the, you know, Depression. And he said, "Well, I can't understand. You're crying he's working too much, and there are men crying for a job." Because dad was making big money, sometimes, he came home with $80, $90 to do the [piece] work. DONALD KOELLER: And then that ended for 12 weeks. When he went back, it was.10 MATILDA KOELLER: Less money. And just all what happened in there is that Paul got an idea to work Friday night so they didn't have to work Saturday so he could go fishing. And then a doctor saw that – Paul had the men working 24 hours straight so he could go fishing. And this one particular time, Paul had been asking him to go fishing. And so this one particular time, it was real hot and Walt went and the weather changed and he took sick. He never went fishing after that because he froze and he was a sick man after that for a long time. Then came in this WWW something; Roosevelt got this order that any person that was not well and was sick should be laid off and only the healthy men worked. So that was the government's order. So the doctors were called in and the men were examined and that day, 50 men were laid off just like that – no warning, no severage pay, no nothing. Well, Dad was a good worker and the bosses wanted him back, but the doctors would say, "No, you can't come back." They even laid him off with [unintelligible - 00:23:23]. DONALD KOELLER: When they were laid off, did they get any kind of unemployment compensation? MATILDA KOELLER: No, nothing. DONALD KOELLER: Nothing. MATILDA KOELLER: Nothing. DONALD KOELLER: No wonder you didn't like Roosevelt. [Laughs] MATILDA KOELLER: Well, you know. after that, I certainly didn't love him because our whole lives [unintelligible - 00:23:51] because we couldn't get no relief. We finally got relief and then we were taken right off of that because I foolishly said that we had a bank account for Waller and there was $7 in it. And they investigated more and found out that Dad's name was on his father's bank book. And we were called in the office and said, 11 "How come?" We said, "No, that's not our money. That's my father-in-law's money. That's his, you know." DONALD KOELLER: That was from his taking care of the finances for Frederick. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, see. And they said, "Well, you use that money." And we said, "That's stealing." They didn't care. They just took us right off, and we had, I think, two weeks of relief and that's all. So Walt did not get any money for two years. Charlie gave us $15 a week and that's what we lived on. DONALD KOELLER: You then moved to 1936 Race. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. There was no other. DONALD KOELLER: How long were you at the Belden apartment? MATILDA KOELLER: One year. DONALD KOELLER: And from there, then you went to 1936 Race. MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. And then things got so, you know, bad after all. No clothes were bought and the boys needed shoes. And there was a lot of WPA workers working and you can only work I think a year and a half on it and then somebody else would get a chance. And so Walt wrote a letter to WPA, saying his children need shoes. We haven't had any income for two years. And so he got on WPA. DONALD KOELLER: When was that? I mean, was that. MATILDA KOELLER: Well, that was after two years that we. Walt was 7 years old when we moved on Race Avenue. DONALD KOELLER: That was 1937. MATILDA KOELLER: He was just almost. yeah, in '36, I think. DONALD KOELLER: '36. MATILDA KOELLER: See, and. Then he got $50 a month. Then he got to be, I don't know what you would call that, a custodian of the finished order, to order materials or order. DONALD KOELLER: With the WPA? 12 MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah, with the WPA. Then we got $90 a month. Dad worked for a year and a half. And in the meantime, Matilda Blackmore was in the hospital and we went to visit her. Matilda Blackmore and Mrs. Wellhaven were in the same room. Mrs. Wellhaven. DONALD KOELLER: How did you know Mrs. Blackmore? MATILDA KOELLER: Through school, through Revere Electric. She was the bookkeeper, see. DONALD KOELLER: Right. MATILDA KOELLER: Now, see, your father lost his job through a Matchless… you know, he was fired there. DONALD KOELLER: Matchless? I don't. MATILDA KOELLER: Matchless, a rubber. well, Wellhaven was the boss there. DONALD KOELLER: Oh, but that would. wait a minute. He got. MATILDA KOELLER: Wait, just a minute. Now, let's go back to the two women in the hospital. DONALD KOELLER: All right. MATILDA KOELLER: Well, Matilda got acquainted with Wellhaven, Mrs. Wellhaven. And she found out that he was in business, that he, you know. and so she spoke up for Walt. "Can you get Walt a job?" DONALD KOELLER: This was when he was working for WPA? MATILDA KOELLER: Yeah. When he was ready to be laid off or maybe he was laid off by then. Well, we get a phone call and he was offered a job for $15 a week. So, he took it. DONALD KOELLER: From Mr. Wellhaven? MATILDA KOELLER: From Wellhaven. DONALD KOELLER: So he went down, he got the job, and from that time on, why, he worked. You know, then somehow or another, Matilda. it was Matilda and us that always got. then somehow or another, she invited Wellhaven and then we got acquainted with Wellhaven, see, with the boss. I think that's how it worked. 13 And Wellhaven was. Anyway, he quit that job. He was in partnership with it and then later on, Walt was fired. Wellhaven started his own buffing business, see. Then there was jealousy, at some man at Matchless and he fired Walt. And after he was fired, he wanted Walt to come back to work. But by that time, Walt had found a job./AT/mb/ee

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