Bernard: And we’re at Mrs. Martha Marshall’s home in Sonora California. We’re at the home of Martha Marshall on Lyons Street in Sonora. Mrs. Marshall I wanted to ask you where you were born.

Marshall: I was born in San Juaquin County in the country between (___) and Wallace. Very close to the Calaveras line.

Bernard: In what year was that?

Marshall: In 1885.

Bernard: Ok. What is your parental nationality?

Marshall: Well I besumed that we were German origin on my father’s side and I think Scotch on my mother’s side.

Bernard: What was your maiden name?

Marshall: My maiden name was Sollars S-O-L-L-A-R-S.

Bernard: What did you father do for a living? Was he an….

Marshall: Well they have this little…it was farming. ‘Course they came here in the early days and I presumed they went towards the foothills on account of figuring that for gold. They would’ve been very much better off if they had settled in like down lower like around Lodi and in that country because that…below in that country was absolutely covered with brush. It was close to the river, so the people they didn’t settle down there. They went towards the hills and…

Bernard: So they wouldn’t have to clear the way (___)?

Marshall: Well, no, they didn’t get where they…they came in those early days on account of gold, you know, that was what they were seeking really at first. ‘Course my father they came the Oregon Trail and he…they came into California in 1860 but my mother came to California in 1853 when she was just a small child.

Bernard: Where was your father born? Was he…

Marshall: My father was born in Indiana and my mother was born in Missouri, but I don’t know whether that was…they moved around, you know, in those days.

Bernard: My grandparents came in 1853 also in Columbia.

Marshall: So…’course some of my…well I think my old…two oldest brothers and my oldest sister were really born in Calaveras County but you just step over the line and you were in San Juaquin County.

Bernard: Were you near Jenny Lynd?

Marshall: No, no. You know where Clements is and Wallace when you go on Highway 4, you know, you go right down there…but anyway…I…we lived there when I was about 12, then went to Lodi in 1890. See I was only five years old, but in the course of time, I went back there to live with an uncle and I graduated from the old Washington School that the rest of the family had all gone to when they were little kids and I hadn’t. I wasn’t old enough to go to school then and ‘course we graduated in that day and age in the ninth grade, eighth…eighth and ninth grade and I was thinking the teachers today, you know, we had…it was a large school. There’s lots of kids and she had from the first grade up, you know, but I think I learned more in that last two years of going to school then I learned all the rest of my life.

Bernard: In what year did you graduate?

Marshall: From grammar school, I think it was 1903.

Bernard: When did you come to Sonora?

Marshall: Well I came to Jamestown the first time. My father passed away in 1898 and I had a sister that lived in Jamestown and I came up there to live with her first.

Bernard: What was her name?

Marshall: Acker, Laura Acker, and her husband had come to them up there. There was a man by the name of Peran in Lodi at a grocery store that Dale had worked for, and he….they came up in that in early times and well its mighty close to 80 years ago and (____) opened up a store, a grocery store, in Jamestown, and my brother-in-law run it. I was thinking I have a niece, but she was…when they came, she was only six weeks old maybe. She lives in Lodi now. Then, of course, I went (___) and in course of time my high…I went to Lodi High School.

Bernard: Did you?

Marshall: I went back to…when I went to high school; I worked in the telephone office while I was going to school. My sister was the first telephone operator in Lodi. Lodi was a very different looking place in that day and age than it is today; and I also went to high school and then I worked in the telephone office. It was just the two operators. I worked just to relieve her and I went…I was supposed to work from six to eight but I usually…she and I were living together and I usually went earlier than that to let her…to relieve her, you know.

Bernard: You didn’t stay open at night?

Marshall: No it was closed but there was a night operator.

Bernard: Oh.

Marshall: But the telephone in that day was a…think what I was going to say…we were very busy. We had many subscribers. In fact, there was those people that came out from Russian…Russia (___) well they were Russian/Germans and they came from the Dakotas and they migrated into Lodi in that early day (___) 1903 and 1904, and they came in there. I can see those old women yak with their little box and all and they took and bought land which was cheap in those days you know. And practically every one of those families are very…they still…

Bernard: They’re still there?

Marshall: …(___) around Lodi and they became immensely rich.

Bernard: Are they the same people that put in the grape vineyards that are there now?

Marshall: Well I don’t know as they…oh yes…you see in my kid days, Lodi was a grain and water malage, you know, that was a great country.

Bernard: Oh I didn’t realize that.

Marshall: Oh but still, Lodi watermelons. Yes that was a great country for watermelons and so it became the afterwards the vineyards; and at the time when prohibition came along, so many pulled out their vineyards you know.

Bernard: Oh they did?

Marshall: Yes and at that time…well prohibition come along during the First World War. You know a lot of the men tried to blame it on the women. It wasn’t the women at all that voted in prohibition it was men because women didn’t have a vote even then, you know, and so I wanted my husband so badly. We went into Lodi afterwards and he worked down there and work didn’t (___) and this…they were selling these vineyards well at plan very cheap and we had a little money but not very much but I wanted so badly to try to persuade my husband to but he said…he figured he’d very likely have to go into the service and he didn’t want to leave me without anything. I said I was a young person. I said I could work, I always have worked and I can work and to this…all our life together but then he always used to say, “Well I can’t tell what we might’ve done. We might’ve sold it…we might’ve…” but they were practically selling that land, I think, about two and a half an acre; that vineyards land. Then after they planted and planted it again you know. It…they…those young days in Lodi, why, they didn’t even have city water. I can remember distinctly when they put in the city water, and at our house, we had one little faucet and hydrant out in front. We’d have this pump inside of our house and there was a pump out in the yard. We pumped our own water and no paved streets, but it was sandy country and it could rain like the mischief in no time it would dry out, you know, but it…I have seen (___) grow very, very much.

Bernard: It’s so hard to visualize what it must’ve looked like then, you know, without all the big trees and the vineyards because I grew up down in that valley and went to high school there.

Marshall: Where did you…

Bernard: Well I lived out north of Stockton…

Marshall: Oh yeah.

Bernard: …and…

Marshall: North of Stockton?

Bernard: Uh-huh.

Marshall: On the old Cherokee Lane?

Bernard: No it was west of Cherokee Lane over near Thornton Road.

Marshall: That’s all very familiar to me…used to go to the dances down to Thornton many years ago.

Bernard: Cool.

Marshall: The…

Bernard: What were the sorts of things you did for social life in the early days?

Marshall: Well we danced every Saturday night at the world. There was always a dance and in the summer time, they had an outdoor platform and of course I was on my kid days were spent there and then when I…most of the time when I was 13, I left there, but then I went back in time and then I ended up coming back up here again.

Bernard: And you came up here to Sonora, how old were you?

Marshall: I came up to Jamestown and stayed with my sister. I came up…she had…they had…she had five children and they had a store there in Jamestown. I don’t care for the people and so she worked in the store and I run the household and the kids.

Bernard: Did you say her name was Acker?

Marshall: Uh-huh.

Bernard: Um…

Marshall: There’s Ackers around here.

Bernard: Does she have relatives in Chico by the name of Acker, Art Acker?

Marshall: Well I…no I don’t think so. Acker is rather common.

Bernard: It is?

Marshall: Uh-huh.

Bernard: I hadn’t heard (___) very often (___) (___).

Marshall: If you ever run across anybody by the name of Sollars, they are relations. We never…we have never run across anybody by that name that we don’t trace into relationship and…but…

Bernard: Did you say…I heard you say once you had an uncle who was the Wells Fargo Agent here in Sonora.

Marshall: It was my brother.

Bernard: Oh your brother?

Marshall: Uh-huh, I work for him.

Bernard: Oh I see…

Marshall: It was my brother who was a Wells Fargo Agent here. I worked for…I came up here and my sister was going to get married and I went to high school with the…only a two-year course. ‘Course we got out on ninth grade and academic course was three years and the (___) course was two years, but Mary and Frank they were just starting out and they had just a small place. And so I would’ve graduated from high school in June but in March I had to quit and I came to Sonora and I worked first in an insurance office here; I worked in a telephone office, and before I got through, I worked for my brother in a Wells Fargo office. Then I went back to Lodi again and I came up here…I came up to take…to keep my house from my sister. I cooked for nine people every day.

Bernard: Boy.

Marshall: All the meals.

Bernard: That’s quite a task for a young lady.

Marshall: And then I started to on with my husband, Matt. We went together about a year and nine months. We were married in 1911 and he passed. We’d been married 55 years when he passed away and neither one of us were young when we got married. He was 29 and I was 25, so we were old enough to stick with each other you know. We didn’t…

Bernard: Where was the telephone office located when you worked in it?

Marshall: Well I think it’s exactly where…I think it’s Ruth’s that has that insurance office place. I think that’s it. It was right…I think that’s the spot right there.

Bernard: What insurance company did you work for?

Marshall: Well I don’t…it was a man by the name of Parker and his place of business was up there. ‘Course you don’t remember…you remember when Harry Ball had it?

Bernard: Oh yes.

Marshall: The old time base where he had originally. Not down in the city…

Bernard: Oh I was thinking of Forty-Ball.

Marshall: Up above…no, no not Forty, Harry Ball. Forty Ball and Harry Ball weren’t related.

Bernard: Yeah but I was thinking of the gun shop. It’s been (___)…

Marshall: No, no, no, but they was down there. They was…do you remember what they called the young men’s club here?

Bernard: No I’ve heard about it, but I…

Marshall: That’s where we used to dance. It was a very narrow…kind of a long, narrow hall and…

Bernard: Upstairs?

Marshall: It was upstairs and I think…’course those places have changed in there, and it’d just be about next to that Oro Club is down there.

Bernard: Yeah.

Marshall: Well you went upstairs there and that’s just about where that was located. I don’t think that same building is in there now; I don’t know. ‘Course the baker shop used to be in there, you know where…

Bernard: Where we are (___)?

Marshall: No.

Bernard: No?

Marshall: At where…I don’t think there’s anything in there right now. Wild Gerome says he bought that but is there any kind….

Bernard: Wild bought where the Oro Club is now.

Marshall: Oh did he buy that too?

Bernard: That’s where the bakery…

Marshall: Oh the bakery then used to be next to that Oro Club. It isn’t the same…

Bernard: Oh I see.

Marshall: …spot.

Bernard: Because John Musio wouldn’t sell it to anybody but Al. He talked Al into buying it.

Marshall: Uh-huh.

Bernard: He didn’t want anybody else to have that building but Al.

Marshall: Well of course we were in business when John Musio and Irene first came here. We had our business over across the street. We had produce business and I wanted to tell you the produce in the produce in that day and age was somewhat different than the kind of produce you get now. There is…down here in the (___) district by Oakdale, they was oilers. Any amount of…these Italians that had wonderful gardens and they bring their stuff into Sonora and we had a good business. My husband and I practically hit it off at some time in the year, my nephews had worked for us but we handled their produce. We handled strawberries and things like that by the hundreds of boxes a day and they would come in and pick those beautiful berries and things would come in.

Bernard: They’d haul them in by horse and team….

Marshall: Well some of them had teams and then they did get that they had to get the cars later you know and that they are beating family.

Bernard: Oh yeah I knew (___) (___)…

Marshall: Did you know some…

Bernard: …the one that works in the bank there.

Marshall: Yeah the one that’s there? Well that’s (___) the boy. He was just a little bit of a tike when we first used to go there. In fact, when we went to the…they have three girls…we went to the wedding of two of them. We went to the old folks golden wedding and went to the funeral of each of the parents, and you see this is Nora. She was one of the Harbeaning girls. She’s married to a Greek that they have that sundial restaurant in Modesto. Of course they had a restaurant in Oakdale for many years, and then they had a restaurant…they were in that Colbell Hotel for a long time and then they bought that sundial, and they have done wonderfully well. They have what they…now there’s the two girls; they’ve always lived in Oakdale and even when they was running the restaurant in Modesto, they have built now one of the most beautiful homes I have ever been in. It’s just unbelievable. Everything was perfection. It was handled of course by an interior decorator. It’s certainly beautiful.

Bernard: I’ll bet you’ve seen a lot of change take place in homes from the time you were little until the present day.

Marshall: It’s unbelievable. Of course we built this house about 41 years ago. It’s just a little bit too big for me right now. My rooms are terribly big.

Bernard: Where did you live before you lived here?

Marshall: Well we lived…when we were first married, we lived right out there next to where Mel was (___) (___). In fact, we had rented a place and had our furniture in it. My sister had become very ill and they had to break up their home and sell all their furniture and everything and we bought all of it and was packed and all brought up here. And you know where Theresa Talenson lives?

Bernard: Uh-huh.

Marshall: That’s on the street is that thing when you make that turn.

Bernard: Shepard?

Marshall: Yeah I guess that is Shepard, yes, and it was so…

Bernard: Shepard’s the one with the turn…

Marshall: ...before we were married and went on our honeymoon, all this furniture was put in this place and my husband had a ranch down here on…way down in the hills and the wood was all open in the basement all tiered up for her and Al Neil…do you know who the…do you know…remember him? He had a store. We were always great friends and we went into the store to get something to make a lunch, but we went out and starting to get settled down and I made the remark to Al I said, “By the way, is your house rented?” He had this place out there and Pickles. Do you remember Pickles Delivery Stable?

Bernard: Uh-huh.

Marshall: Well they had just moved out and Al says, “Why don’t you take the kid to go out and look at it?” I said, “My heavens we already got a house rented.” But we went out and looked at the place and Max says, “Call mom and tell him we’ll take it.” So we moved…we moved before we ever….and it was a much better place, but you know those houses. Then afterwards when we went into business, had our business (___), we lived very primitive I’ll tell you that to compare to what…but we worked and that’s the only way we ever got ahead start and we lived back that (___) store. There was one great big room and another place that we fixed it up to a certain extent and there was a (___) little bedroom and we lived in that place for about four years and then that house in the back. You know where Murry Profeena lives now?

Bernard: Uh-huh.

Marshall: The one they just torn down?

Bernard: Yeah.

Marshall: Well we lived in that house for, oh, I guess ten years. We were living in that house when we built that house. You see my husband worked for Mundorf for many years and ‘til he retired, he worked for Mundorf for a great, many years.

Bernard: Was he born in this part of…

Marshall: He was born in Shaws Flat.

Bernard: (___) (___) (___) Norma Jean?

Marshall: Well (___) mother and my husband were sister and brother and Katheryn too. You know Katheryn?

Bernard: Yeah.

Marshall: Well Katheryn’s mother was Matt’s half-sister.

Bernard: Uh-huh and Alvin’s related somehow too?

Marshall: Yes. Alvin Sylby was my husband’s…Alvin’s father and my husband were half-brothers.

Bernard: Oh.

Marshall: And see they were full blooded Portuguese, but you know then they come to this country and change their name and (___) (___) Matt’s father and mother were both born in the Azores.

Bernard: Azores uh-huh.

Marshall: And so then he had another full sister. There was three of them. There was Matt and Minnie.

Bernard: I met Minnie.

Marshall: You’ve met Minnie.

Bernard: Yeah.

Marshall: You’ve met her up…she comes up to the reunion.

Bernard: Uh-huh.

Marshall: And she was a teacher. And that set her through Normal, San Jose Normal. We’ve had to work all of our lives.

Bernard: How long did you work in the Wells Fargo office?

Marshall: Well I imagine I stayed up here at that time. Let me see…1904…I imagine I worked for (___) (___) probably a year and at that time is when the gold came in. All the gold that was shipped came into Wells Fargo office and it came in here and if these pockets had gotten out, they had came in and they sends it in to be coined, made into coin into the mint.

Bernard: Went into the mint in San Francisco.

Marshall: Went into the mint in San Francisco and then when it came back, if it came under the Wells Fargo seal, you had to open it and count the money out. And when I’d seen those beautiful stacks of $20 gold pieces it’s unbelievable and two or three-thousand dollars at a time. And…they….you know up that…when they had a meeting I went to and they were telling up there to the Wells Fargo office was…so I told them I had…I had to tell them that they were wrong because when I worked the Wells Fargo office to be on the south-east corner where the park is. It was right below the court house.

Bernard: Yeah.

Marshall: That’s where the Wells Fargo was then.

Bernard: Isn’t that where the Turn Green Hall was?

Marshall: Well the Turn Green Hall was on the other corner.

Bernard: Oh really?

Marshall: Like the category corner like this and on this one corner here in front Ed Doyle had a saloon and let’s see…well The Turn Green Hall went through half of that block.

Bernard: Oh I see.

Marshall: See it went clear to the bank where they had dances and shows and so forth. That’s where the Wells Fargo’s office was. Then afterwards it was in different places; it had to be in other places before and been down there with a…restaurants.

Bernard: They’ve got a marker on that building down there…

Marshall: Yes we marked that there.

Bernard: Where the gym (___) used to be.

Marshall: Where the gym was. Well the Wells Fargo office was there one time.

Bernard: Was there first before it was up there…

Marshall: Oh before it was…that was before it was up that corner and then later…I’m not sure now whether that was over or afterwards. It was at one time…I think Marks had moved there (___) (___). I think it was on that corner at one time and then the lasted Wells Fargo when we were in business, there’s still Wells Fargo and well we got what they called American Express. It was right up there where…next to Ells Beach…what we called Ells Beach Corner.

Bernard: Uh-huh.

Marshall: It was that building right there.

Bernard: Beneficial Finance Corner.

Marshall: Uh-huh it was in that building right there (___) (___).

Bernard: When you had worked, was it a brick building? Did they have a vault and everything in it?

Marshall: No we just had a big safe.

Bernard: Oh I see.

Marshall: And my brother used to say, “If anybody comes in and wants to hold you up, don’t ever try to make any resistance just let them take it.” I spent in that Wells Fargo’s office myself when there was thousands of dollars in that place and in the winter time it would be pitch dark by half past five practically. I always remember these people of the name of Lewis, Susan Lewis and her husband. Susan belonged to the Wells…to the Native Daughters for years and years. Well up to the time she passed away, they took out a beautiful pocket up here on Bald Mountain and it went and came back and these beautiful…I don’t know how many. It was hundreds of dollars and they come down in the pitch dark in the evening, had their little old basket with them and took it home. This day and age they would’ve been held up before they got out the front door.

Bernard: You didn’t have any problems them when you were there.

Marshall: What’s that?

Bernard: You didn’t have any problem then with…

Marshall: No…

Bernard: …robbers…

Marshall: …no…

Bernard: …when you…

Marshall: …never had any problems at all.

Bernard: They’d hold up the stages.

Marshall: Huh?

Bernard: They’d hold up the stages.

Marshall: Oh yes, yes but never in the office.

Bernard: The time you worked there, were they still driving the horses or did they have…

Marshall: They were still driving horses. Mr. Trask, you know George Trask father…

Bernard: Uh-huh.

Marshall: He drove it…about had the horses but he come to meet the train every morning and every night he came to meet the train, and my brother had…I had another brother that worked for him and they had this little wagon and they had it…it was a horse drawn and the horses originally belonged to my uncle and my brother bought it and my younger brother he rode that horse from that ranch up to Sonora. He didn’t do it in one day I’ll tell you that and brought this great, big horse and it was a great, big (___) and that horse got so that he’d go out there, they’d drive him out and he…they’d have to come in and back in the room and that horse can do that by himself just as quick as anything without any body saying anything to him. And after…you remember Hospins? Ellenwood Hospins don’t you?

Bernard: Oh yes.

Marshall: Of course I want to say Al because we always called him Al. His father bought that horse from my brother after my brother went away from here and it was a great, big fellow and I think my brother rode him up here; and I’m sure he didn’t have a saddle and he…of course he…I think it took him about three days to make the trip riding on horseback.

Bernard: How old was he? Was he young?

Marshall: Oh yeah he was young. He was about two years and a half older than me. He was just a young fellow and he came up here and worked for my brother. I guess he must’ve been only about maybe about 20 or 21 and he married Betsy Landers. Do you remember Landers that run the city drug store?

Bernard: I’ve heard the name but I don’t know them.

Marshall: He was the owner of that city drug store and he had a son and a daughter and my brother (__) married her.

Bernard: How old were you when you joined the Native Daughters?

Marshall: I just…I joined the Native Daughters on the third day of April in 1906 and on the 11^th day of April I was 21. I belonged…it’ll be 69 years in April.

Bernard: Did you belong to any other lodges…?

Marshall: No and you know I was one of these kids. Of course my father was very firm believer in women’s rights. That’s before we ever…women ever voted and so I was a very firm believer in women’s rights too and I was one of these kids from the time I was up (___), I said, “I’m never going to join any organization that a man can join.” It wasn’t that I didn’t like men, I like men better than women as far as that’s concern, but, you know, all these like all these other organizations that the Odd Fellows and all the men. But Native Daughters and Native Sons absolutely separate you know, so I had always said that I…and I’ve stuck to it to this day.

Bernard: Isn’t that funny. I had an idea that you belonged to several lodges. I used to see your name on the paper.

Marshall: I belonged to the women’s club. The old time women’s club that we had here you know.

Bernard: Was that before the (___)?

Marshall: Yes.

Bernard: Was that the one they called (___) Welfare?

Marshall: Uh-huh.

Bernard: That’s the one I wanted to ask you about too.

Marshall: Yes.

Bernard: What did they do?

Marshall: Well they…what did they do any? It wasn’t a study club or anything of that sort. Well I’ll tell you one thing we did, we built the Memorial Hall.

Bernard: The one…

Marshall: The big Memorial Hall here. We were the ones that started the fund for that thing and you know that Memorial Hall…I don’t know whether you remember that. That used to be more private than your own home. Nobody met there you know only the….

Bernard: (___).

Marshall: Yes but the Native…but the Native…the Welfare Club we did meet there, but nobody else. That thing was more private. It was perfectly ridiculous you know it wasn’t supposed to be built for poor people (___) (___) but Frank Ralph was the….

Bernard: …the supervisor?

Marshall: Yes supervisor and that one place was absolutely a private home. When it come to…we had taken up a collection but we started…do you remember…you don’t remember Edith Moran, do you?

Bernard: Oh yeah.

Marshall: The first…do you remember Edith?

Bernard: Yes.

Marshall: And there was Edith Moran and Edna Hales. There’s nobody left. I guess I’m the only one still alive that belonged to that. No, Edna Harden belonged.

Bernard: Uh-huh I wanted to get some information on that because I’ve always heard about the Wild Bear Club and never…

Marshall: And you know that…as you come into town that…now the city had taken over that (___) that…what…that monument when you come right into town where that…down by the…

Bernard: Down by the fairgrounds?

Marshall: …down…no…down at the…down where you…well I think that now they made they made a little flower (___)…

Bernard: Was it Bradford Avenue? Where Bradford (___) (___)?

Marshall: Yes, yes the road (___) Club for that thing.

Bernard: Oh they did?

Marshall: Yes.

Bernard: I don’t know what’s written on it but I…

Marshall: Well (___) (___) but it doesn’t say “Adios” or “Hello” in Spanish you know “Welcome” or something on it. The Welfare Club did that.

Bernard: In the garden section now there’s a little garden around it.

Marshall: And…you remember Mame Symons?

Bernard: Oh yeah.

Marshall: Well she was one. She was one of the Welfare Club bunch and we worked hard at that thing, and that was…

Bernard: The Welfare Club and the Aromas Club were both in existence of the same kind?

Marshall: Well not particularly…I think the Welfare Club to a certain extent had sort of…gone out for many, many years we had money in that thing, you know. Mame Symons would…I don’t know who did get it before we got through…we kept donating it to different things after the Welfare Club wasn’t going.

Bernard: …active anymore.

Marshall: Wasn’t active. Well there’s Laura Toms. You remember Laura Toms?

Bernard: Yeah.

Marshall: Well she was another…one of the active ones and I remember distinctly one of the things that we did during that First World War. You see we didn’t have rationing then but we did better than people do…we didn’t have rationing. We went throughout this whole county. We visited every house in this county, a certain bunch of us. It was Edith Maron and I was one of them and I think Cary Warren too. We went to Tuolumne and this town. We canvased every house in this town asking to join what they called…signed what they called A Hoover Pledge and I’m just wondering yet I had that Hoover Pledge for many years; had it since I’ve been in this house and I just wonder if I was foolish enough to have thrown it away. When they signed this pledge, they signed the pledge that you would…what you would use that you would only use a certain amount of sugar and we had a flower at that time that it wasn’t all straight flower; it was mixed with different things and if you signed the pledge to do these things, you put this Hoover Pledge in your window and people stuck really and truly stuck…’course it wasn’t the people that wasn’t coming at that time….

Bernard: I remember…

Marshall: …but they really stuck with it.

Bernard: I was old enough then to be…my mother…

Marshall: Sort of remember…we took in Tuolumne…

Bernard: Uh-huh…we always baked our own bread.

Marshall: I remember your mother and father well.

Bernard: And my mother had…she worked in the post office…

Marshall: …yeah…

Bernard: …and it was up to Marie and me to make the bread and we used these (___) flours…

Marshall: …different things…

Bernard: Uh-huh.

Marshall: (___) an oven and so forth and so on and as I say we canvased this whole county and I always…I never will forget was…who was old Henry Burton. He had a car…he was in the car in that day in age. They were a little bit different. They were open and the wind blowing you practically out of the things. We went to Groveland and we went all through every place there was in Groveland and then we had for our supper, I guess it was, at the hotel over there…

Bernard: (___) (___).

Marshall: …and I can always remember what they served us for dessert and it was canned peaches just a small half…no canned apricots I think it was…and just one little lousy half and they were floating around in…

Bernard: …syrup?

Marshall: …and it looked…when they brought it, it looked just exactly like a raw egg…just exactly like a raw egg. I can see that yet.

Bernard: You had to go up the Old Priest Grade?

Marshall: Well surely, yes.

Bernard: That must’ve been really something to go up and then…

Marshall: Well I drove up that Old Priest Grade in 1910 with a little wagon and a horse. There was four girls of us that went to Yosemite Valley. Of course you couldn’t take a car into Yosemite Valley in that day.

Bernard: There weren’t that many cars around in 1910 in this area.

Marshall: No there wasn’t and you couldn’t go in if you wanted to, so we…when we left, we left Jamestown, I forget how early it was in the morning, I think all…I’m not sure about whether Ethel…it was Ethel Ralph and Mabel Morgan and a cousin of the Morgan’s, Elle she lived in Portland and myself and of course I was the one…I was used to horses, you know, and I was usually driving and we had one of these great, big horses. He was about that wide in the back you know…

Bernard: There was just one horse?

Marshall: One horse in this little…this little…like a little (___) wagon would be.

Bernard: And two seats in it?

Marshall: There was one seat but both seats were nothing but the board about this wide and my brother-in-law told me when we left he said, “It’ll take you three hours to go up Priest Grade.” You know Priest Grade is only three miles long…short Priest Grade and I thought well sounds silly. What you doing monkey? Isn’t she got beautiful fur?

Bernard: (___) (___).

Marshall: And it did take us three hours and further more everybody walked but me the driver. They walked up that thing.

Bernard: If you’ve never gone up the Old Priest Grade, you can’t appreciate what you’ve done…

Marshall: No I don’t…its good now from what it was then in that day and age.

Bernard: Oh yes. It must’ve been quite steep.

Marshall: Oh it was.

Bernard: Gravel road and dirt?

Marshall: So the first night on our way we went from Jamestown and the first night we stayed all night in Groveland and the next night we stayed at Crocker’s and the next day we got in late in the evening we got into the valley. It took us that long to go from Jamestown to Yosemite Valley.

Bernard: Did you have…was there a hotel in there?

Marshall: There was a hotel and there was also a Camp Curry. We stayed at Camp Curry and the strangest thing, you know for four girls, I was married just six months after that, but we stopped…you know that was…the bridge going across the river, a toll bridge, that crosses the…what do they call that crossing?

Bernard: The Tuolumne you mean?

Marshall: Crossing the river over there.

Bernard: At Stephen’s Bar. No, see, you didn’t go Stephen’s Bar.

Marshall: Oh…

Bernard: Yes you did.

Marshall: You go through Groveland, above Groveland.

Bernard: Oh above Groveland?

Marshall: Above Groveland, yes. There’s a bridge there yet I think, but that was…it’s crossing the…

Bernard: Oh South Fork?

Marshall: Yeah that was the Tuolumne River and you had to pay toll there, but anyway there was four fellows from San Francisco. They came to go to Yosemite Valley and they had to get off at Chinese Camp and then they was (___) they were too tired. I drove them in there and they gather up there and stop at the same time we were there at this when you cross the river, ‘course we all got acquainted and all, so the fellows went on. They were ahead of us and we were gonna meet at Crocker’s and we did, we got in it was almost dark you know and they got to worrying and they knew us four girls and they were just started out to come down the road to see if there’s anything happened to us and so while we were in the valley, we went every place together. We walked up to Glacier Point.

Bernard: Oh (___).

Marshall: Walked to Glacier Point.

Bernard: Yeah.

Marshall: And there was one girl from Oregon, Portland. She had never been around horses and she couldn’t understand how I would stop that horse to let it blow all the time, you know, that’s (___) especially if there was four of us riding. She thought it was a foolish thing to do; couldn’t understand that. So when she goes to walk up to Glacier Point, all the rest of us are up there and in our head wondering what in the world had happened. Well she never…you know how…your throat will just nearly strangle you to death, she never got her second bread as we call it and she liked it and never got up there and she said to me, “Know I understand why you let that horse stop (___).”

Bernard: The altitude was probably bothering her too.

Marshall: What’s that?

Bernard: The altitude might’ve been bothering her too.

Marshall: Oh yes, yes…

Bernard: …pretty high…

Marshall: …and we walked up there and also coming down and coming down is…would get a little…start kind of a little jog or something and you just couldn’t stop; you just practically run all the way down it you know.

Bernard: That’s right.

Marshall: …and oh we walked all the places. We walked it all when we were there in the valley too; and it was in June when we went early in June and so the pot holes were very…just full and the funny thing is that the fellows had said to us. We were in ahead of them I guess. I think they stayed at Crocker’s and we got reservation at Camp Curry and we asked for reservations for those four fellows. When they got there, they were taken and they got to stay down to the Sentinel Hotel and they kidded us all the time. They’d say, “We stayed in a hotel and you folks are down there in the camp.” What they had were these forts with tents over them. That was what they…and we stayed there and we had our meals. Well I think at lunch time if we went anyplace they fixed us a little lunch for $3 a day.

Bernard: And you got your dinner and breakfast…

Marshall: Dinner and breakfast and good food and our sleeping quarters for $3 a day. I think all we had us girls only had about $20 a piece when we went and then on the way back, we stayed at Crocker’s again and then we came back as far as Priest. You know Priest had a (___)…

Bernard: (____)

Marshall: …right at Priest Grade they had an eating place and rooms and they had (___) up the hill. We had rooms there and talk about I never…and talk about the good meals. They made for dinner every night…they made these beautiful, homemade like rolls but they were fixed different you know (___) (___) of course in that day and age we were young, you know, we could eat.

Bernard: Well the ladies in that valley are noted for their meals anyway, weren’t they?

Marshall: Yeah well that was way back. That was at Camp Curry and our horse…we had a stable cost us two bits a day for the horse. Isn’t that something?

Bernard: Geez.

Marshall: And going in…we did…they fed the horse and all but we did take a sack and all with all our weight we had a sack barley with us because my brother-in-law said we had to feed him. You see that this horse gets some good food and so when we went in not knowing it’s against the law to pick a snow flower which we did you know and when we went into the stable, one of the fellows right off the bat he saw those and we just had a couple of these snow flowers and he said, “Well you girls are going to get in trouble,” he says, “don’t you know it’s against the law to pick these snow flowers?” So he hid them for us.

Bernard: You had all the fellows watching out for you on that trip didn’t you.

Marshall: Oh but we certainly did. We had this little wagon had a little top on the sides, don’t you know, like a little delivery wagon they used to deliver groceries in…

Bernard: Yeah.

Marshall: …that’s what it was like and my husband was down there, he wasn’t my husband then, my goal…he was down to Jamestown to see me and he never went home until twelve o’clock and we got up daylight to go and when Matt went home, he looked…everything was all loaded in our suitcases and everything was in this wagon. And when we got up in the morning to go, that wagon was pasted all over with signs…all kinds of things. One of them I particularly remember says, “Father’s pants will soon fit sister,” and all those things pasted all over and we never took the signs off we left them on and every place we stopped somebody would come out and pasted a sign on our wagon and we always blamed but he never admitted…there was a fellow named Murphy that was the (___) to the old Nebble’s Hotel was the one there and he was the one bartender over there and we always blamed…they all everybody knew we were going to take this trip and we always blamed him for coming over and pasting those but he never would admit it, but I’m sure…

Bernard: (___) way a pretty ladies (___) (___)…

Marshall: …he’d been saving up these things for heavens only knows how long…out of newspapers, you know, things…headlines that he’d clip off and…but he never, never until the time he died, he’d ever admit it that he did it, but we were pretty sure he must’ve done it. Now he had to stay up until after twelve o’clock because Matt…it wasn’t on there when Matt went home and so…

Bernard: Practical joke or…

Marshall: We really have had a great trip. It was…I think we were…it took us…we stayed in the valley, I think, five days and it took us that three days in and out you know, practically three days.

Bernard: Did you have sleeping bags then to put in these tents.

Marshall: No, no we stayed in these…they’re like motels you know.

Bernard: Oh they had stopping places one way.

Marshall: …stopping places along the way and…but you know I was thinking when we out of business…when we had our store, we had a little Model T 4 with what they called a (___) (___) that was the second gear in the Model T and we went all the way into Vancouver, Canada with our little, old Ford and they had these stopping places. They were…what kind they were…I guess they called them motels then, but you had to furnish your own bedding and everything. You carried your own bedding with you. It cost you about a dollar and a half a night, and things to cook with, cooked your meals in the places, and we went up the coast. That was in 1926 and we went out of business and so…