Melvin Carlson, 1975-07-21, Interview #1 - MP3 Recording

Segment Synopsis: Train ride to Idaho from North Dakota; Archie and Melvin
passed as twins, one 6 the other 8; oldest brother Ed came
ahead in freight cars with cattle and wagons. Troy is dusty,
muddy and has stumps in the street. Grubbing stumps out
of Main and 5th Street. Stump pullers; saw dust, gravel
and asphalt demonstration.

Segment Synopsis: Big Meadow CCC Camp; graveling county road; no snow
plows; CCC boys shovel snow by hand. Going for the mail on
horse and skis. The Big snow of 1912, driving over fences
on the crust; Silver Thaws; reason why not so much snow
these days.

Segment Synopsis: Fires of 1914 and 1931; lost 140 cords of wood; DDavis
saves house with 35 gallons of water, 9gallons of milk, and
some cream. The fires' beginnings; how they were fought.

Segment Synopsis: To school 2 and a half miles; brother on a sled rips new coat on
a barbwire fence. Food. Cream money; testing the cream;
brother Vic takes the cream to town; Mrs. Gregory, a heavy
lady, upsets the buggy and spills the cream when she asks for
a ride to town with Vic.

Segment Synopsis: Raised strict; brother Archie and hoseshoe games. Chores,
dishes before school. Fishing and swimming in Big Meadow
Creek. A friend catches a 20" salmon in the creek.

Segment Synopsis: Fishing stories; hiking to town; hunting; coyotes; cougars and
their womanly scream; Mrs. Strom scares a cougar away.

Segment Synopsis: Walking to school; first teacher, Hester Snead, had glasses
with mirrors. Troubles at Burnt Ridge school; brother
Frances was a problem. Kids in town went to high school, rural
kids not as much. Types of work. 3young people drown (1921).
Melvin's mother dies in 1922. Alfred Hayes a school pal.

Segment Synopsis: Playing baseball; winter coasting parties; skiing on crust,
accidents, riding a scoop shovel as a sled. Nelson's pond
used for making ice; cutting ice blocks; hauling ice to
Christie's Ice House in town.

Segment Synopsis: Kept ice at home in sawduct pile for summer ice cream;
keeping food cold. School teachers put kids in grades for
convenience. Hoeing beans at 8 years old; going shopping in
Moscow for school clothes; dime to go to the show, sneaking
cigarettes. Knickerbocker pants; working in harvest like a
man at 12; youngest sister dies at 5 in 1918. No doctor in
Troy. Flu epidemic.

Segment Synopsis: Thrashing; sisters as cooks; working as a sack sewer - the
hardest job; 150 pound sacks, 800 a day; mending sacks; the
needle, 9 stitches for a sack of oats, 11 fee a sack of wheat.
Liked thrashing; competition by women to provide best
food; always chicken; rain at night.

Segment Synopsis: IWW in logging camps; left woods; sawing with brother Ed,
a taskmaster; grading skid roads at Elk River; cutting cordwood.
Doing the cooking as young boy; baking bread and two failures;
cooking for engineers in Alaska.

Segment Synopsis: List of games; Fox and Geese in the Snow, Ante-Ante Over,
(continued)

Segment Synopsis: Ante-Ante Over, Keep Away, tags, Fruit Basket Upset,
Spin the Platter, Kick the Can, Magic Tricks, Three Deep,
Musical Chairs, Skip to My Lou, Cap. Jinx, Virginia Reel,
Old Dan Tucker, Pop Goes the Weasel, Go in and Out the
Window.

Segment Synopsis: Gustav Skill compared to square dancing; music by Byers.
Music at Burnt Ridge, piano; borrowed phonograph at Big
Meadow School; literaries; oyster feeds at Burnt Ridge.

Segment Synopsis: Keep-Away, relays. Melvin shoots his right hand on a dare,
neighbor takes him to drunk Dr. Olson in Troy; since accident
all guns are loaded; friend in Alaska with booby-trapped guns.

Segment Synopsis: Cat and Mouse, Poor Pussy, Jap Sticks. Ice staking story;
ski jumps; riding in sled and diving into snow drifts.