Oral History — Priceless

Linda Hardin Sehrt attended school at Gallatin. Her mother is Helen Hardin who resided in Gallatin for many years. Linda’s grandparents, mentioned in the story, were Nellie and Esquire Gambill, who farmed between Gallatin and Altamont. Their farm is now covered with water in the deepest part of the middle area of Lake Viking. Nellie Gambill was a Smith and had many siblings who farmed in and around the Gallatin area.

Linda Sehrt, regent of the Independence Pioneers Chapter, NSDAR, submitted the following essay for the Daughters of the American Revolution Women’s issues essay contest.

Her essay, "Oral Histories…Priceless Conversations" placed fist in the family topics division for state and also placed first in the six-state South Central Division of the DAR. Mrs. Sehrt was honored at NSDAR Continental Congress held in Washington D.C. July 8-12.

Mrs. Sehrt encourages everyone to take time to tape interviews with family members to preserve a historic pathway to the past.

The following is from a taped interview of Mrs. Sehrt’s grandparents, Nellie Smith and Esquire Gambill, conducted 29 years earlier for a college journalism class assignment. Mrs. Sehrt found the tape recorder tucked away on a top shelf in a closet.

"My hands actually trembled as I pushed the ‘play’ button," recalled Mrs. Sehrt. "Not only was I hearing grandma’s voice, but grandpa was also talking. I could feel my heart beating. I can’t describe the anticipation I was feeling."

@headline = Keeping history alive…priceless

On the tape recording, grandma talked about the depression. She and grandpa owned a farm in northwest Missouri so they had plenty of food. They did have to sell all but three of their cows. Each cow brought $20. Hogs sold for three cents a pound. She didn’t sell chickens, she explained as she laughed, "If they were fryers we ate them." She went on to say, "I had eggs. My hens were the best layers around."

According to my grandmother, you could buy 100 pounds of bran at the poultry houses. She would mix that with soured milk and feed that to the chickens. Makes good egg layers!

She would sell 15 gallons of cream a week. I spoke up and mentioned the cream separator. Grandma quickly reminded me that wasn’t the separator used during the depression. It was a water separator; not the electric separator I was familiar with.

That comment brought questions from me about electricity. I knew my grandparents were almost the last ones in their area to go on electricity. Grandma talked about how expensive it was. Grandpa originally thought it was foolish and electricity wasn’t going to be around long, just a frivolity. You had to put up your own pole and buy your own wire and it cost $3 a month. Grandpa quickly responded, "We didn’t need it. We didn’t own anything you needed electricity for." I, personally, never thought about that. Not only was it something new, but what did they own that needed electricity for it to work?

Grandma spoke of terrible drought years. Things were so bad that they would cut down elm trees for the cows to have something to eat. The cows would eat all the leaves. You couldn’t go buy grain or hay for them to eat. The drought years seemed harder on the farmers than the depression. Grandma actually sounded sad as she remembered selling all but a team of horses. "You couldn’t let them starve," she said.

Our interview led to conversation about the first gramophone they had. Grandpa interrupts the conversation and says he thinks it’s a Victrola phonograph. They purchased their first television in 1957. To my surprise that was the televison they were still watching in 1980. They’d replaced the picture tube so it was working just fine. They didn’t have a radio during the depression and they didn’t have newspapers. Grandma wasn’t really sure there were any newspapers at all in their rural area. They didn’t know about the depression. They just lived day by day, made do with what they had, helped the neighbors if they needed it. Grandma’s answers make a lot of sense to me now. During the interview she tells me people try to out-do one another, spend over their means.

Life isn’t simple anymore and people aren’t any happier with all the things they can have now. People need to quit spending and save for the bad patches in their lives.

Grandma spoke of the government WPA program, poor houses, the orphan train, and the CCC Camps. In her opinion, there are times people need the government to help out. Some people need Medicare and nursing homes, but she says, not at other people’s expense. Everyone must help themselves and work hard, not take a hand out. If you have to accept help, pay it back in some way.

I am really missing my grandparents. The memories flood back and I can see them sitting at the kitchen table nervously anticipating the interview. Grandpa had told me he wouldn’t let me interview him but he is getting excited about the questions I am asking grandma. It becomes evident that he feels he is helping grandma remember things. I try my best to put in some questions about his service in World War I but he says, "you don’t want to talks about those things." Grandpa served in the Army from June 24, 1918, to June 11, 1919, and was in the Meuse Argonne offensive, American Expeditionary Force (A.E.F.) in France.

Grandma only attended school through the seventh grade but says she could "out cipher" the boys. Other than her family having a Bible, she remembers only owning one book in her lifetime. It was a gift from her teacher for never missing a day of school and never being late. The book was Mad Little Hannah. Grandma could run as fast as the boys, pitch the ball straighter, ride a horse better – when they’d let her play. But, most of the time she had to cook, watch the little ones and sew. Even if my grandmother didn’t take a fancy to cooking and sewing, she was fantastic at both. Grandma made the best breads and pies. She sewed all of her clothes, her children’s clothes, and even my clothes when I was a little girl.

According to Grandma, she did have store bought shoes. "They were usually black leather, with high tops and you put your laces through hooks." She did remember buying slippers once, "They were pretty, with straps."

Grandma was the seventh in line of 16 siblings. She stayed home after seventh grade to help her mother with the younger children. She remembers the family gatherings and playing with her cousins. They went to church. She enjoyed it when her father would hitch up the team and wagon and take them to church. Usually family, neighbors and work hands all stayed for Sunday dinner. Life was a lot simpler, according to grandma. You didn’t have all the worries because you didn’t know what was happening elsewhere. You did your share of the work. You didn’t want what you didn’t have. You tried to do what you were told to do. You cared about your neighbors.

The tape is finished. What a wonderful treasure to find. I feel like I had a chance to visit with my grandparents again. Oral histories are very important, not only for our libraries, but for our families. My grandson never met my grandparents. I will share this tape with him. He is in sixth grade this year. He has recently studied World War I and the great depression. This taped interview will give him a better understanding of the depression and rural life on a farm in Missouri. Maybe he will get a true sense that WWI was an experience that was hard to talk about. Hopefully, he will find himself listening with keen interest to a conversation taking place when his own grandmother was a student — such a long time ago.

I also interviewed my aunt, Marjorie Frost, for the Quilter’s S.O.S. project and it is on their website and archived in the Library of Congress. Marjorie is the widow of Marvin Frost. She was also the daughter of the Gambills. She is the mother of Barbara Landes.

It was so much fun listening to aunt Marjorie talk about how much quilting means to her and how she would show her quilts and what ribbons she won.

Her story includes things about my grandmother, my mother, and my cousins. Her story talks about feed sack materials, hand made quilting frames, 29 cent pattern books, and heirloom gifts for grandchildren.

She tells of her husband’s encouraging words to use colored thread for her stitches. I received a thank you letter from her today. She writes, "I consider this a nice honor for your DAR chapter, also, I think I, my children, and generations to come will benefit the most from this project."

She is right. Oral histories are personal conversations preserved for generations to come. It is a priceless gift for your family. To paraphrase a popular commercial…The price of a cassette tape $2.29; the price of a tape recorder $24.99; the oral history interview itself — PRICELESS.