Document text
July 25, 1939/
Submitted by: Seymour D. Buck Newburyport, Mass/-
WPA Worker Consulted: Myron Buxton (36)
2 urange Street
Draftsman Asst. to Engineer
WPA Occupation:
!rank up a chair, if you can find one. You'll see some
old copies of LIFE and LOOK over on the end of the desk. Help
yourself. Shove those blue prints aside, hey, wait for a
second. Hold that up, will you? Is that the one for "Ferry
Wharf?" Give it here, will you? I spend half an hour earlier,
trying to find that damned thin,. Thanks:"
Myron Buxton grinned, and weighted the print down before
him with bottles of red and blue -black ink. The yellow pencil
lightly followed several of the faded lines, and he nodded,
"That's more like it. How the Hell did they expect me to locate
a boundary, when all the old deed gave was, "suffitcient space
to graze a cow and a half?" Now I've got it, from Bartlett's
warehouse ENE to the limits of Ferry Wharf, bounded by
"What do you think of our WPA project headquarters?" he
asked, as slim fingers tightened down on the T square, and the
stark black line traveled steadily across the gray -white paper.
"Used to be a horse -station Fire House," he informed. "The smell's
not too bad, as long as you don't go opening the trap in the floor.
"There's one of the recreation projects upstairs, so
that's two rent-WPA projects, anyway. You know, they did the
slime thing we're doing up in Haverhill, only they hired pri-
vate engineering concern, and paid out over fifty thousand
dollars to locate boundaries to city owned property along the
waterfront, and around what used to be the "common pastures" and
like of that.
"Whole thing won't run this city much over $600.00," he
stated, "and if I do say it, the job's some mess to start in with.
Shack into Salem a couple of times a week tracing back old deeds,
trying to find where the Hell some old Wharf or right -0f-way
used to run, fifty seventy-five, even a hundred years ago.
"Some of our landowners down around the Square are going
to make some naughty noises when they find how they're owing the
city rent for about forty years for land they been occupying for
their lumber and coal yards, know it? Stretching over a couple
of feet at a time, maybe, until now they've encroached plenty.
"You ought to look this city over before you try to do
much work on it. It used to be quite a place, you know. Back
in the days of clipper ships, and rum distilling. Boy, those
old sea captains, they used to make their dough I guess the only
real difference between those privateers and pirates was one had
the grace of some paper from the President, and the other prayed
to escaplLby the grace of God and a fast wind.
"Just let me finish this print here, and I'll be all set.
Paul's been out sick nearly two weeks, and this isn't my strong
forte, by any means. You can watch a drawing just grow as he
works along on it. With me, I got to pray, when I get to the
end, that the lines meet and don't pass, about three -eighths of
an inch apart! Give me the leg work, outside, I don't mind
lugging the transit, and I like working out in the air. In
here, I don't know, the whole place sort of closes in on you,
and it's stuffy.
"How's anybody going to settle down and do a real day's
work, anyway, when they never know from one week to the next if
there's going to be laid off or if another one of those Social
Service guys is going to come poking around, to see if you really
do owe five hundred bucks, and how come you're able to run a
car? Hell, without my car, I'd be sunk on this job. People don't
seem to figure how necessary it really is. Hop from here, four
miles out to Lowe Street, maybe, checking up on some drain
locations in that new "Back Bay Sewer" set-up. Imagine it! They
went head digging for some new lines, an,'21 started bumping into
P
gas pipe and water mains, right and left. I don't know another
city in the country'd have all that stuff laid down and no plans
to show how deep down pipes were, or how they ran. Comes of not
having a City Engineer.Seems almost as if all the people in this
town wanted was not to be bothered with anything about the place,
how it runs, or what happens, as long as taxes aren't sky high,
and they can have peace and quiet!
4.
"One reason people here don't like WPA is because they
don't understand it's not all bums and drunks and aliens! Nobody
ever explains to them that they'd never have had the new High
School they're so goddam proud of if it hadn't been for PWA. They
don't stop to figure that new brick sidewalks wouldn't be there,
the shade trees wouldn't be all dressed up to look at along
High Street and all around town, if it weren't for WPA projects.
To most in this town, and I guess it's not much different in
this, than any other New England :place, WPA' 15 just a racket,
5
'let up to give a bunch of loafers and drunks steady pay to indulge
in their vices! They don't stop to consider that on WPA are men
and women who have traveled places and seen things, been educated
and found their jobs folded up and nothing to replace them with.
How you going to call Doc Crowley, for instance, a bum? Prac-
ticed a dentist, and now his eyes are goin7 bad, think
he's not damn grateful for WPA? How about these college fellows,
some of 'em on here with me,- M.I.T. graduates, U. of Alabama
Dartmouth Yale plenty of them can't get work, and why?
People here'll tell you why. "The man doesn't want work,
that's vitly. You mean to tell me an U.I.T. graduate's got to go
to the WPA to make a living? I donst believe it Drop him off,
and see how quick he finds something to do. Why, I could use
him, of course, I couldn't pay him what he deserves for wages,
but I could hire him, anyway, so he could get by.'
"They don't make any allowances for differences in a
man's skill, or education, or whatever. Course there are men on
who ought to be placed in institutions, and marked out as no-
goods. Same thing holds on WPA as every other place in the
world, some know guys who get them on, and that's that. Mean
to say in private industry there aren't plenty who got there
because they knew somebody who could say the heavenly word,
"rake him?" Sure.
"I'd give a heap to be hooked up with sofiething like
the U.S. Coast Geodetic Survey, for instance. Then you've
got something ahead of you, longer than a month at a time. I'd
be no dumber than plenty already on, but I just don't know
anybody to say the good word for me, see?
"This Newburyport's the last god damned place you'll ever
get yourself a job, though. The peopleive got the money'd a
damned sight rather see this just a beautiful, old-fashioned
horse -an& -buggy town, -without even the horse buns in the street!
"I mean it, honestly. Maple Wood Heel, take them.
When they were working night and day shifts, what happened? The
poor citizens on Harris Street couldn't sleep, nights. I don't
mean poor in dough, anything but! Result? Maple Wood Heel
moved out of town, and then people squawk about high taxes.
The Airport they talked of building, there's another example.
The government sent aviation men up here, they surveyed the ground
out back the other side of our residential High Street, a
corking sweep of flat land for miles! l'retty soon, you began to
hear all kind of objections to having an airport here, even if the
U.S.A. IAA going to practically build it for them, and there
was rumor, even then, about what a corking training place it
would make for the Army's flying kaydets: "Too much noise all
the time." "Somebody might come crashing down on our heads"
no airports:
"Anybody'll tell you that NeWburyport's a place all by
itself, more ways than one. I don't know if it's where so many
of the people marry cousins and like that, or what it is. Mitt,
so help me, the good old stock's sure gone to seed, around here."
Buxton had finished putting each silver instrument in
its purple bed, carefully weighted the several sheets of paper
to prevent their rolling toward the center, and now reached
for his soap and towel. "Be with pou in a minute. Let's get
out of here. I'll show you some of the town. Take you for a
ride along our famous High Street, so you can see some of the
splendid examples of architecture, with weeds two yards high
in the lawn, windows all boarded up, and "For Sale" signs
plapered all over the old houses. Christ, they can be bought
for a song, but who wants to try heating 'era? Seems like some
of them cotld be made over into damned nice two-family apart-
ments, but you know you got to start right from scratch plumb-
ing, heating, wiring, guess it's a$ cheap to just yank the old
builaing down and put up modern stuff.
"Anybody in this town that can boast of a bathroom where
it belongs, in the house, and not an old-fashioned wood -box
down cellar, honestly, this place's some town.
"This is Federal Street, down there's the Merrimac River.
Behind us, up at the top of the rise, High Street stretches along,
from one end of the city to the other. That's. the real residential
section the what 'Bossy' that's our famous ex-gayor, you've
heard about, calls "shanty Irish," live there.
"Gambrel -roofed, houses, grat big square old-timers, two
and a half stories high, with Captains' Walks, some of 'em with
really beautiful cupolas, too, the Jewslv started to get a hold
there, now, though. Down the lower end, that if. You can figure
on it, another ten maybe twenty-five years, and this whole
section'll be just like down along Milk Street filled up with
Jews! Not only them, there's the French-Canadians work in
the shoe shops, and boy, there's nothing spreads any faster,
unless it's A forest fire, than them kind.
"Don't get the idea that I go around shooting my mouth
off like this. I don't. Anybody around here who even so much
as thinks about anything else how things aren't always what they
seem, then he's a "dangerous influence" next thing to a flag-
waving 'Red'! Stick you ear to the ground, get in a visit to
the Dalton Club, if you can wangle it, you'll find out, quick
enough what makes the wheels turn, or not turn, like they got
it now!
iti's life an the WPA I'm supposed to be telling about,
not preaching Socialism, isn't it? O.K. I was born! Haverhill's
my original starting -out -place. Went through grade and High School,
and then my career came to an abrupt halt! My father was a
skilled shoe worker, mother never was physically in good shape
since I was born, in '03. That's why it seems to me there's
no chance of my doing too much for her, as long as she lives!
Father died, here, and then it was up to me!
"There was good money, those days, in the shops. I used
to figure everything,: was right with the world, you don't
think so much about injustices and inequalities, all the things
that oughtn't to be, when everything's going rosy with you,
know it? It's only when you get like this, plugging on WPA
never knowin when the axe will fall, finding mit how little
people think of your abilities because you're stuck on WPA
then you begin to read about things, and find that all over
everywhere, there's two kinds of people, the kind on top,
and the rest, some of whom are trying to get on top, most of
whom are just riding along, trying not to think about things
any more than they can help.
"Well, to get back where I left off. When Maple Wood
Heel moved out of town, I was stuck. Couldn't see trying to
unload the house, move mother to where it was all strangers, and
get another start. Ever since then, things have just gone back-
wards, smetimes in little slides, and again in big falls! I've
got, now, so that just holding on takes all my energies, and
then some!
"People are quick to jun* you, I'm single, I own a
car, what the Hell do I need of WPA work? O.K. I've got to
eat, just as much as the Polack with nineteen kids, right?
9.
I've got a car, sure. Registered it and paying for insurance
on a monthly -payment basis. Why the car? Try lugging transits
and stuff on your shoulder ten twenty miles a day, from one
spot to another between Newbury and West Newbury and you'LLsee
how a car fits in. Because I have to have it for the job, I'd
better not try to take my mother out riding evenings, that'd
be having too good of a time, especially where the government's
paying me!
"Hell, the whole thing's a laugh! The working guy in
this country never had such a swell chance to get a toe -hold
as he's had in the last four years! The louder the Republicans
yell, the more of a toe -hold you can figure the ordinary guy's
got! You talk about these WPA strikes, trying to save their
prevailing wages -rate, and save being laid -off on 30 day, or
more likely, permanent vactions without pay! Why the Hell try
to lock the barn after the goddam horse's stolen? Time to make
a squawk about something like the Relief Bill's before it gets
onto Congress' floor. Suppose, now, for the Hell of it,
that every single worker on WP OL and sent one telegran to his
Senator and Representative. Suppose he had brains enough to
word it, maybe like this, "Insist on Recognition Ri ht to Work
Stop Ly Vote Counts." You think that that would have gone without
making any impression? Why the Hell blame Congressmen, they
hear plenty against us, and only about once in a year some
little group with leaders who ain't even at heart fighting for
the WPA worker at all, their interests are all eentered on
themselves and what they're really after, you know it, don't
you? them kind calling work -stoppages getting all the publicity
they can: Publicity like we've had only hurts like Hell!
"Some'nody'd ought to really write a book on guys like us:
Trouble would be to get anybody to read it. You could take and
make up stories enoup7h, twisting things around so they didn't mean
*hat you thought they'd mean when you started the story, but
Hell, even if people did read about us, half that did would say,
"Gee, I had no idea there were such good things done on WPA. Splen-
did! There surely ought to be 9 place in private industry for
such people as are as deserving as they're made out. The rest,
well, I guess there are always going to be those kind, but they
got no business making as much as I do working forty-four hours
in a shoe shop! No sirree! It can't go on forever, of course,
the government just can't find the money for it. Quicker it's all
wiped out, now, the quicker we can really get business into shape
again."
"No mention about real trouble with business overpro-
duction. No talk about how these WPA guys are going to get by un-
til Republican leadership manages to show them there really aren't
the jobs they thought there'd be, but so what? Aren't we better
off than in Italy say, or Germany, or, maybe, Japan?
"We got troubles enough right here in this country, not to
try to help others out, right now. It beats Hell how we got to
try to move battleships around and swap notes that don't mean any-
thing, anyway between governments, trying to make this damned
world do differently than the real guys behind everything intend
all along it shall do! You think Chamberlain's what he appears?
It's not him, Hell, the guys who run England would do the same
thing with Winston Churchill, just that the "front" would be
covered up with more bombastic sounds, that's the only difference.
Those guys are gambling that anything's better than letting Russia
get a foothold anywhere outside of their own country, that's all.
Maybe they are going to find they've gone to bed with the wrong
woman, but, when it's too late, it's too late, that's all.
Only thing is, for Christ's sake, lets us keep to Hell out of it
all! I'm not holding we can lick the world, Hell, no, but
I'm betting we can keep any enemy from ever climbing our own backs.
"Veteran, me? Hell, no. I'm in-between! I know a lot
of vets, they're all regular guys, too. Aren't many of them who'd
go do it all over again. Some, sure, there are always some who
think of it as "bang -bang Paris whores and vin rouge! The
most of them haven't forgotten trenches, yet awhile. Let 'em go
after all the damned favors they can get, I say. I don't begrudge
'em a thing! What the Hell, the guys who have to pay for it are
mostly those who stayed home and made the rocks, those day, right?
"I know, when you come to put your name in over to the Navy
Yard, you'll find what a difference it makes where you fit on
the list, if you're a "vet," but, at that, oh, well, Hell!
"Woman? Look, let's skip that! I've been going with a
girl for too many years to think about! She works when she can
in the shops. Marry? She's got her mother to help out, and I've
got my mother to keep going! The two don't mix, brother! Now,
I've got so I just try to forget things when we're together,
and even if both of us do feel the same, that we're letting
everything go by that counts,. precious little we can do about
it, right now! It's funny, too, for spite of our being together
like that all thetime, we seem to get along 0.1. We don ft agree
on everything, she thinks I do too much reading about everything,
ought to just take things as they are and make the best of them,
but what the Hell?
36, now. She's two years older than I. She4.0-41110-
$aanna-aldeab-then-27 Americans, both of us. Native stock, too,
whatever that amounts to anymore. I ought to'v been a preacher,
I guess, the way I'm going on! Hell, I couldn't preach like this,
though, from any pulpit. Maybe I could start one of those "whisper-
ing campaigns." D'you read that article in the Satevepost about
them? How you can hire this concern to start a campaign for you,
knocking a competitor's goods, making up a sweet lie out of
whole cloth, and plastering it from one end of the country to
the other? Swell stuff, right? Wait until the old Republicans
get on the receiving end of one of them, instead of taking every
god damned advantage to spread everything against "F.D." they
cant Boy, oh boys
"There's one of the prettiest buildings in town. It's the
Dalton Club, now. There's where the big wigs hang out nights,
playing a little poker, talking a little talk, and drinking
a lot of drinks! It used to be the "Tristram Dalton" house back
13.
in the old days, a sweet building, too, know it? Look at those
windows, that door! There's the Newburyport of yesterday, and
it is a honey, tool. The red brick building sprawling out across
the street, there's "Wolfe Tavern" "Where Your Ancestors Tarried."
It's not the original building where the Tavern was, but it's a
nice example of the ancient tavern brought to life, even to the
gaudy stage -coach they keep parked out front to attract attention.
"Lets drop in the Tap Room. That's around on the Harris
Street side. You won't get as big a glass of ale as down at some
of the "joints" by the Square, but the company's not quite so
rambunctious, errer." Buxton laughed and led the way within the
marine-muraled interior of the old tap room..
"Not too bad, eh? I'd kind of like to get done in time to
shoot up to the girl's house before curfew, if I can, so here
goes! You've got me born, grown up, single, working on WPA.
I suppose the next thing's where do we go from here? I wish to
Hell somebody'd tell me! This 30 -day acation thing will tell one
step, I calculate. The vets111 be down on the doorstep of City
Hall waiting for the Soldiers' Relief agent! Most of the others'll
be lined up on the sidewalk, filing into the Public Welfare office!
As for me, what the Hell can I do? If there's anything I hate, it
is to have to go down there and look for a damned grocery slip,
but I haven't got a chance of paying two weeks' bills with my check,
when it does come,- and being able to finance myself more thai
two -three days. Then what? I don't know, honestly! My names in
for work in the shops, you can't even register in Boston anymore
for work, they'll just look at you as if you were nuts or somethingg
"Why," they'll say, "we can fill jobs for ten years just from the
people living right here. Go back where you came from. If you
can't find work there, there's certainly nothing here for you!"
So it goes! You know, for a long time I didn't dare tell mother
I was even on the WPAI Then, of course, when the checks came to
the house in the mail, the jig was up! She felt terribly about
it all, but what could we do? If I do have to hit them up for a g
grocery order, and God knows I don't know what else I can do,
then I sure hope she don't find out about it. I'm only hoping
that the guys that plan this Relief Act may see how foolish it
is to hope to drive us into jobs don't exist, and maybe keep us
from having to go through all that damned charity business again.
Hell, I feel like I earned my money, working for it! I can hold
my head up, for I'm not loafing, nor trying to cheat in any way.
When that's taken away, good -night! One thing I will say, to
you! When the city hasn't got funds to finance Public Welfare,
and they start in squawking to the state, and then when the state
finds the Burden's more than they can swing, you'll see how long
it takes the old birds in Washington to realize it's government
help, or else it's only that it's too bad to make all the guys
go through *hat they've got to, first, in order to convince Con-
gress we're not just throwing a lot of heifer -dust about our-
selves, right?
"Cheer up. We haven't starved yet, and we're not going
to. Maybe things are all balled up, damned little doubt of it.
On the other hand, just because people around New England feel
like they do, about Roosevelt and Democrats, depressions and WPA's
no sign everybody does, know that, don't you, Roosevelt's
started in helping farmers and them out West, they're votes count.
There's the "solid South" they talk about, and when everybody's
needing re -adjustments like today, they'll come. Only with the
guys who have the money hating to part with it, r well, it comes
the hard way, that's alit I live a day at a time, now, I don't
read NATION and NEW REPUBLIC much, now, get all stirred up
about everything, and can't change so much as my income two -bits,
what's the use?
"If there were any way I could get the ear of somebody who
had an "in" with the Coast Geodetic, I'd give ten years of my
life for a "knock -down" to them. Opportunity, that direction,
hasn't got to knowk, brother, all it's got to do is just start
to pull its hand out of its pocket ready to reach for the door,
and I'll be there waitingl
"O.K. now? Take a few days to look the town over, and you'll
get a slant on it, all right. Anybody that's been anywhere, or seen
anything outside the place, don't have much work to make something
out of things around here. Maybe, underneath it all, there's a
lot I've missed, I wouldn't be surprised. I know people are people,
whether it's here or in Hoboken, N.J. Human nature's the same, too,
only it does seem's if there were an awful bunch of "queers" on the
loose around here, that's all, and as if the "regular guys" had
all taken to the woods for keeps1