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Forms to be Filled out for Each Interview
FORM A
Circumstances of Interview
STATE New York
NAME OF WORKER Wayne Malden
ADDRESS 51 Bank St. New York City
DATE January 5, 1939
SUBJECT A LESSON IN MOOD. -LORE
1. Date and time c° interview December 28, 1938
2. Place of interview
53 Bank Bt. New York City
3. Name and address of informant
Miss Lena Fusco
53 Bank St. New York City.
4. Name and address of person, if any, who put you in
touch with informant.
5. Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you
6. Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.
FOLKLORE
NEW YORK
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, for any of the forms, each
bearing the proper heading and the number to which the material refers.)
FORV
Personal History of Informant
STATE NEW YORK
NAME OF WORKER WAYNE WALDEN
ADDRESS 51 Bank St. New York City
DATE Nanuary 5, 1939
SUBJECT IL LESSON IN WOOD -LORE.
1. Ancestry
2. Place and date of birth
3. Family
4. Places lived in, with dates
FOLKLORE
NE' YORK
Miss Lena 'timico, 53 Bank St. N. Y. C.
is about 40 years old and has been a counselor
at certain settlement house camps. The present
tale is related of Madison House Camp.
Miss Fusoo is 4merican born, but, as the name
indicates* is of Italian parentage. She attended
for a time the labor college of Katonah, N. Y.
She is at present a housewife.
5. Education, with dates
6. Occupations and accomplishments, with dates
7. Special skills and interests
S. Community and religious activities
9. Description of informant
10. Other Points gained in interview
FORM C
Text of Interview (Unedited)
STATE New York
NAVE OF WORKER. Wayne Walden
ADDRESS 51 Bank St. New York City
DATE January 5, 1939
SUBJECT A LESSON IN WOOD -LORE
FOLKLORE
NEW YORK
The talk, as it was bandied about by one and another sitting around
the restaurant table, was not of a particularly high order. But we talked of
many things. Cabbages, I think, were not dwelt upon, but there was mention
of kings, at least dictators, and the inevitability of much that might, after all,
fail to occur. It was fairly well agreed, as I remember, that the history of the
next world war will never be written, for the simple reason that no one will be
left to write it. "And be just as well", said a misanthrope among us,"for
the deemed human race ain'',; fit to survive anyway."
Had the indictment been less sweeping, it probably would have been more
provocative of some fitting retort. None of us seemed inclined, however, to
champion the whole of the human race, But the somewhat banal remark, "The
more I see of human beings, the more I like doge& with which the tirade ended,
was a bit too muoh for a lady who until now had not been loquacious.
That catchphrase, slightly irritating to the group itself, was the cue
to which my informant responded. If she did not speak poignards and every word
a stab, her opening remarks were at least as fraught with wisdom as anything the
misanthrope had said. PrObably. too, they tended to restore a dim sense of our
individual importance to the rest of us. "I like dogs", she began, "I like them as
well as any normal person might be expected to like dogs. But, contrary to certain
-3.
appeared in no less a periodical than the Hobo News. Thereafter Slim's business
and calling cards bore testimony to his being a "Poet and House -Painter." Slim's
heroes were about the only persons he took seriously, and they were contemporaries
of the American Bison. Whether they were actual historical characters, or but
fictional, is of no particular importance to Slim. From Kit Karson to King Irady,
they were great guys.
"Maybe you're right" Slim addressed the speaker, "near as I can see
through what you been I:Wm', but these city kids, these little MOp kids and
Jew kids and all the other little Orangutangs runnin' round the streets --has
your gapings of them convinced you that there's many Danial Boones among them?
Like among our four fathers?"
"Indeed no", laughingly replied Miss l'usco, "I must say that I have
not in my igapings' of these east side boys encountered:many Danial Boones.
The style, I'm afraid, is now somewhat outmoded. Dense forests have pretty
well disappeared from New York City's streets, as you will see, if you'll use
your 'gapers', and grape -vines along with them."
"The scenes from the time of Danny Boone have shifted, but there is yet
an effort to acquaint the kids with woodlore, to know something of the nature of
what small birds and animals and plant life that still remains. My experience
is that the brats react to the instruction as typically native born kids, which
they are, whether Mop', tKiket, 'Mick', or 'Merican.' As a counselor in a
camp nearby New York, where these east side boys and girls are brought in big
batches ever summer to sojourn among natural surroundings, I have dealt with
hundreds of them, and 'gaping' at their behaviour, as well as their misbehaviour,
I find that their pranks are boyish rather than to be described as Jewish, lOppish,
Irish or any other ish. Even Indianish", the speaker added, as an afterthought,
to a rather long sentence.
"At the camp, at least once a week, we devote an evening to woodcraft
and to hearing from the kids their reports of whatever animal, bird or plant, may
have been noticed in their rambles, and of which they profess a thirst for
knowledge. We gather round a camp -fire as a council of Indian scouts.. -the kids,
of course, are the 'scouts', and a more mature person, generally a teacher, or
head counselor, acts the part of the 'chief'.
"Often these counclls, as they are intended to be, are not only enjoyable,
but educational as well, We generally derive something from the*, but as happens in
the best of all human arrangements, they sometimes become farcical, when the scouts
are feeling more frivolous than decorous. On one such occasion the Chief, who
happened to be unusually solemn lady, seriously desirous that sense rather than
nonsense should rule the deliberations of the assembly, had 'Pebbles' and'Stumpyt
to put up with. They were both little devils, and always cutting up some sort of
monkeyshine. Pebbles nickname was because his real name was Littlestone. Anyway,
our sagacious Chief, elevated upon a comfortable, vineolad stump, cushioned with
soft and glossy green leaves, sat through the session giving oracular advise, and
listening to the reports of the little eastside Redskins. Many of the queries
asked by the noisy young Indians, if at all serious, would be respectfully answered
by the Chief. Too much levity she didn't like, and would bawl out the kids when
they tried to get just too funny.
As some of us expected, it wasn't long before Pebbles had a say in it.
Rising from the midst of the other scouts, squatting in a semi -circle in front of
the austere Chief, his face as impenitrable as a real Indian's, Pebbles began his
stuff. Probably he had prepared it with the help of other of the braves, and had
rehearsed it before an audience of the little devils. 'Oh Chiefs' he began; as
me ard Stumpy was comm' up the road today, we seen a boid what was knockin'
on wood. Stumpy asked me what kind of a bold was that and I told him it was a
woodpecker an' that it always knocks on wood. So Stumpy kinda got scared and puts
on his hat.'
Whatever the Chief might have replied to this was lost in the boos and
loud laughter of the boys, with the giggling accompaniment of the girls. But
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the look the Chief bestowed upon Pebbles would have shriveled the soul of a less
dauntless scout. But Pebbles was a perserving Redskin, and he made a sign for
the rest of the kids to be silent. Again he arose and, beginning with the customary
'Oh Chief', says, in referenoe to another feathered creature, likely of his own
imagination, 'Oh Chief could you tell us guys what kind of a boid this was -it wasn't
a canary, cause a canary is little and yellow; it wasn't a robin cause it didn't
sing like a robin; it wasn't a chickenhawk an' it wasn't a eagle either, but
we thought maybe z2y. could tell what it was. The last we seen of it was when it
flew on to the limb of a pickled -herring tree
By now the &grieved Chief could stand no more. 'That will do', she said,
'these council meetings are not for the purpose of showing off as clowns. This
is not a circus. It is with an idea of teaching you children some useful information
on nature and woodcrafts that we hold these camp -fire gatherings, and if you don't
come here prepared to play your part as you are supposed to, you may stay away.
'That, for the time being at least, finished Pebbles and his ilk.
But it was an innocent little girl who preoipated an end to the
evening's session. The sweet little thing had been noticing all along that the
Chief sat among the pretty vines. 'Oh Chief' said that dear little scout,' what
does poisen ivy look like, and does it hurt when you set on it?' 'Poison Ivy'
answered the vise Chief, 'is a shiney leafed plant, which at this time of year
should be carefully avoided.
Contact with it is most likely to result in trouble,
blisters at least, and sometimes serious illness.'
'Oh Chief', responded the well instructed little girl, 'ain't you a settin'
in poisen ivy right now?i
,"As this appalling fact struck the horrified Chief her guise of solemnity
and chieftain dignity evaporated as suddenly as it took the leaping lady to clear
out from that comfortable stump. The Chief, herself, had learned a lesson in
woodcraft, and for the rest of the season scrutinised where she sat."