Vol. 2-Interview-Maloney

DM inter. M/M Falatko -36- Tape 11 8/11/72

MF maybe it did and maybe it didn't

DM Then everybody wanted to know what the secret recipe was

CF Nobody did know but me and the mother, well she wanted me to finish it

DM She got what she asked for I guess, well I think that's all I have to know about this, at this point, if I find you out on the porch again sometime I'd like to talk to you some more if I can come up with some stuff I know you can help me with

CF I don't know nuthin' else

DM Oh I don't believe that, you're like Bella

MF Maybe there's some things you know that you forget and you have to be reminded

DM Sure, I wouldn't expect to sit down and say, now here I am tell me all you know about Eckley, you have to come up with some things and that's why I told you ahead of time so you could be thinking about it a little bit, you know I had to study up on it myself so I would know what to ask and that's the only way we can do things

MF Were you up to Bertha's already

DM Angela's been taking care of Bertha and she really likes Bertha

CF I was going to tell you to go up there about this story because she was a saleslady, she was a butcher, she was everything in that store she was a butcher and everything

MF She worked there for years

CF [Blank space] when I came here because I didn't know much about the stores

MF She knowed because everything was in her head

DM Do you know what she did for us, she drew a complete diagram for the whole store with everything in it

CF Bella did

DM No Bertha did and you know I have not met her yet, I would like to tho

CF That's my sister

DM inter. M/M Falatko -37- 8/11/72 Tape 11

DM I know

CF I was goin' to tell you that

DM She was really good, she really helped a lot

CF She must have been a good woman

MF Well she was over here about a week ago and you know that she couldn't even sit down she said she had such terrible pain in her back

DM I've had back trouble myself

MF So told her to go to the doctor like she was supposed to, so I don't know if she went or not

CF I told her but when someone tells me I tell them, I told her you need a good man to give you a good rubbin' whew, did I get it there

DM Has she ever been married

MF No always single

CF She could get married lots of times, she had boyfriends

DM I was going to say according to a lot of people she was such a nice lady

CF She was, she didn't want to leave mother, mother was old and she didn't want to leave mother

DM Was she the youngest in the family

CF Yeh, no Ronica is the one in Freeland

DM But she was the one that took care of the mother

MF There was a guy that wanted to marry her from Highland, a guy from Eckley, 2 from Eckley

DM She turned them down

MF She turned them all down, she seen so many trouble that they get married and the

CF There wasn't so much trouble in Eckley with young couples like now and there's none now because there ain't no young people

DM Well as long as we're on that subject it seems to me that the wife of a miner if you make a decision to get married that it's such a rough life, first of all

DM inter M/M Falatko -38- 8/11/72 Tape 11 you got the children to take care of and the house to take care of and you have all this work to do and you had to take care of boarders maybe if you can afford that and if you have a house big enought to take care of them and that seems like an awful job and it might be better to stay single and avoid all that

CF There were very few boarders in Eckley, because everybody had terrible big families so there were no boarders here

MF Some families like Gaffneys up there, 18 they had

DM Oh there were a lot

CF There were 14 of us there and mom and pop, 16 and they had how many grandchildren about 12 or 14

MF Every family had a lot

CF Kushners, Sorgenson's had a big family

DM Not rrom for any boarders around here

MF God no

CF Unless they were related somehow [blank space] but no strangers, very few

DM That makes for all strange arrangments, a stranger living in somebody's house, I don't like that

MF My mother, may her soul rest, she said they had boarders but when we use to bake bread they had they use to have a tub and they would make the bread in the tub and they would make 10 or 12 big pans, when you have boarders like that you don't have to be choicy because you had potatoes and cabbage and bread you were satistied

DM You were happy you had something to hold body and soul together, well how demanding could you be, how much could you expect, you were lucky to have a place to call home

MF And you had to clean the house

CF They had no beds some were layin' on the floor on straw, in the summertime on the shed, on the roof they were, I don't remember that

MF Well my mother said, make a mattress out of straw and that's what they had they didn't have mattresses like we have now

DM inter. M/M Falatko -39- 8/22/72 Tape 11

DM Oh no, I know it was very primitive, what did they have to pay, a dollar a month or was it more, plus food whatever their share of the food was

CF They claim they use to figure it out together, how much the butcher, how much the store man how much the milk man or whatever they had they'd figure out and ecah one would pay so much

DM That wasn't a bad idea

CF I don't know we never had no boarders

DM But the boarders were around like in Jeddo and

CF What boarders in Jeddo, there was boarding houses there, they were down at #2 at Buck Mountain where them 2 houses is and there was about 7, 8 homes down there but them Greeks that use to come, I don't know what country that is Croatian or whatever it is, but them homes were filled up with them boarders but they didn't work in the mines, in the strippins' them strippins in Buck Mountain that's where they worked only in the strippins, that's where the boarders used to be, but now you ain't got one boarder in

MF Now they don't allow them because you don't know who you're takin' in

DM That's true, a guy could come and live in a hotel and then people would know he's a good guy then people might let them board with them

HF You can't trust them

CF I wouldn't want to have a boarding house

DM No I wouldn't either, too many strange people in the world, I know I lived in a rooming house in West Hazleton for a week before I moved here, that's not my way of living lousy little room on the top floor of a lousy boarding house, that's no way to go

MF And you know that time they use to have an awful lot of bed bugs no matter how they were cleanin' and still they couldn't get rid of them, today if you wanted to buy one you couldn't

DM I was goint to say I've never seen one, and I don't know why that is

DM inter. M/M Falatko -40- 8/11/72 Tape 11

HF They just disappeared, bed bugs and cock roaches, but we never had any

CF Down at Buck Mountain in them boarding houses had them

HF Oh yes

DM I lived in a place the first time I had a teaching job I ordered a new apartment in a new apartment building and they didn't have it finished yet and they stuck me in one of their old apartments over a garage and the garage had a dirt floor that place was full of cock roaches and I didn't even unpack, I left all my stuff in the car and used only what I had to use and my mother said, leave everything in the car and leave the car door shut and don't use the stuff and leave it in the car and when you move out shake everything out make sure there's no bugs in them

HF Yeh, make sure you have it aired out good

DM Oh that was terrible it only lasted 2 weeks but that was a long 2 weeks for me. I think you guys must be ready to eat dinner, aren't you

HF No we're done a long time ago

DM I'm going to go up and get all the left overs out and heat them up that's what I'm going to do, it's easier

CF Well what does he eat if he's on a diet

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