Document text
6,4,440(44 --a*-44(4, .404.4)14
Accession
W 9651.
Date received
10/10/40
Consignment no.
1.
Shipped from
Wash. Office
Label
Amount 7p.
(Incl. forms
A -D)
WPA L. C. PROJECT rite UNIT
Form -3
Folklore
Collection (or Type)
Title egbogt town...af Auhurit_
Place of origin
Oregon Date 2La4,13 9
Project worker Manly Ma
Project editor
Remarks
Form A
Federal Writers1 Project
Circumstances of Interview Works 72rogross Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Man.y& Banister
Address 2071 S.W. Park Avenue
Subject The Ghost Town of Auburn.
Date February 24. 1939
Name and aeA:-.!ss of inforimAt Mrs. J. N. Doane
:s=4^..r=cm-a. sasamixat
Date and ;:eur,e cf f--..t,-)rview February 23 afternoon.
Place of interview 2825 N. E. 35th Avenue
Name and aO,dress of persnn, if any, who put you fn touch with informant
ProJeot files Elks Building
Name and address of person, if any, a3compenTl.nc you None.
Description of room, house, surroundings, etc. The house is a moderate
drowning in the neighborhood of Grant High School. The interior plainly and
simply furnished.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the proper heading
and the number to which the material refers).
W9651
Form B Federal Writers' Project
Personal History of Informant Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Manly M. Banister Date February 24, 1939
Address 2071 S. W. Park Avenue
Subject The Ghost Town of Auburn
Name and address of informant Mrs. J. N. Doane
2825 N. E. 35th Avenue
Information obtained should supply the following facts:
1. Ancestry 6. aocupations and accomplishments with dates
2. Place and date of birth 7. Special skIlis ard interests
3. Family 8 Communty and religious activities
4. Places lived in, with dates 9. Descrintion of informant
5. Education, with dates 10. Other points gained in interview
None is available except for what already is in the office. Mrs.
Doane absolutely refused to divulge any facts of her awn life, declaring
that she would not be mentioned because she never lived in Auburn, but about
eight miles from it. She offered some esoteric reason to the effect that
people would read this stuff and know that she did not live in Auburn and they
wouldn't believe any of it then. It all sounded very difficult and confusing.
The material we have conoerning her she declares to be false. She said that
a woman interviewed her the last time, promising not to use any of the facts
she gave her about herself, but these were filed, and now Mrs. Doane claims they
are distorted, and it is very unpleasing to her.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the proper heading
and the number to which the material refers).
Form C Federal Writers? Project
Text of Interview (Unedited) Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Manly M. Banister Date February 24, 1939
Address 2071 S. W. Perk Avenue
Subject The Ghost Town of Auburn.
Name and address of informant Mrs. J. N. Doane
2825 N. E. 35th Avenue
Text:
I don't know why you people come to ma to find out about Auburn because
I never lived there. I lived about eight miles from town, over by way of Sumpter.
Of course, I VIA8 in Auburn a number of times, but I never lived there, so any-
thing I could tell you couldn't be worth much. I'll tell you who you ought to
see and that is W. S. Hughes. He is street commissioner in Baker, Oregon, and
you could get hold of him there by writing him a letter.
Maybe I can tell you a little bit, I don't know what. Mining was all
there was in those days, you know. There were no pastimes to speak of, because
everybody had to cork. There were several families lived there and they went
visiting each over on Sundays. Dancing MRS the only recreation we had. We danced
the popular dances of that time. The parents all went and took their children.
I remember the first time I ever danced. I was just eleven years old at the
time but don't you put that in there, I wouldn't want anybody to know that.
They danced all night in those days, and at midnight every one stopped for the
midnight lunch which was really the main attraotion. There MAS a big log house
in Auburn where we used to dance., and I think it is there yet. It had a big,
open floor upstairs, and there were people living in the downstairs. We could
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the heading given
above).
Nia. J. N. Doane Form C 2
dance upstairs until midnight, then we would all go down stairs for lunch in
these people's place.
Everybody VIVA friendly in those days. If anyone was sick, there was
always somebody would go and sit up with them, or if somebody died, all the
people would go and help prepare for the burial. It was what they called
"paying their respects." I remember one fanily that had typhoid fever, and
the people all got together to help them out. They got food and clothing and
things like that and took it over to them.
There was very little crime. People left their doors unlocked and
never had a thought that any one would steal from them. Now I don't know
whether you have ever seen a miner's cabin or not, but they were built with
a lean-to, a little kind of shed with a slanting roof, either in front or in
back, and in this lean-to the miner cached all his supplies and his wood and
stuff like that. They would leave the doors of the oabin unlocked and the
lean-to piled full of wood and food and other things like that, and go away
sometimes for the whole winter. All they asked was that things be left as
whoever came along found them. Anyone that passed. that way was welcome to use
the owner's cabin and his mood and things while he was gone, as long as they
replaced everything.
There weren't many celebrations in those days. About three or four
times a year, I guess was all. There VAS Washington's Birthday, the Fourth
of July, Christmas, and New Years. Those were the times when the big dances
were held, and I guess that was about all because everybody had to work too
hard to get together often. Sometimes small groups gathered and played cards,
like Casino, euchre, and other games of that sort.
Almost everything people used was shipped in. They even raised very
Mrs. J. N. Doane Form C 3
little stuff at first because they didn't know they (soul& Almost everything
had to be hauled in from Umatilla Landing. Sugar cane in 100 pound barrels.
Poople had their oven beef, and they made their can butter. In later years they
found out that the ground mould really produce, and they began to raise vege-
tables. That was when I was a girl.
They didn't have as many vegetables, either, it seems like in those
days. There were oabbages, apples, potatoes, onions, and beets and that was
about all. No carrots or other vegetables like people have now. I don't know
.why. not. Oh yes, there were dry beans, too, and -a little canned stuff, but not
nearly so much as they have nowadays. There was no such thing then as comae&
milk. People bought lots of molasses and pickles in five and ten gallon kegs.
When they got vegetables, they got them in large lots mad buried than in *hat
were called root -houses. These were dug underground, except for the roof
whioh was like a mound just at ground level. It MA cool and dark in the root
houses and vegetables would keep a long time. Another food we had was oyster soup.
Everybody was very fend of oysters, and usually it was the main dish at parties
and dances when they had the midnight supper.
The women had to buy material and make their awn clothes, but the awl
bought theirs already made. All they wore was overalls and a shirt and leather
boots. Heavy mackinaws and coats of that kind were the style. There was no
such thing hardly as dressing up. All shirts came with just a neokband and no
oollar. The men wore paper collars with these. They could sear than a time or
two then throw them away because they were so cheap. There was no way at hand
in that place to launder collars. The men never hoard of such a thing as press-
ing their pants. Later they took to wearing celluloid collars and cravats,
and these were more of a blind than anything else. The cravats were very wide,
Mrs. J. N. Doane Form C 4
and with just one of those and a collar on, a man didn't need to wear a shirt
and seldom did. Of course, they wore a coat, and the cravat covered the front
of them so you couldn't tell whether they had a shirt on or not. The men more
leather boots for dress, when they came to parties and such -like, and they were
usually a newer pair of the same kind they worked in. They used these for dress
until the old ones wore out, then they would work in the newer ones and buy
still another pair for dress.
There was very, little singing in those days. We had no radios or phono-
graphs or anything like that. My family owned the first organ in that part of the
country, and for the dances they usually had a couple of fiddles; first and second
fiddle they were °ailed. When we did sing, we sang the songs of the times. I
can remember one was "Grandfather's Clock," and than there was "When You and I
Were Young, Maggie," and "Silver Threads Among the Gold."
Criminals were shunned in those days, and mostly everybody was honest.
They had the saying then that a man's word 111111 as good as his bond. There was
a tree near town which I often saw when I VW a girl. A man had been lynched
there onoe, but I don't know as I ever knew what for. It was just a local
curiosity, and everybody pointed it out as a tree on which a man had once been
hanged.
Speaking of clothes again, young man in later years began to wear silk
scarfs and they pinned these with gold pins made out of curious nuggets they had
found. That was quite a popular thing in those days.
Mrs. Dorcas Brown oan't tell you anything about Auburn, either beoause
she never lived there. Oh yes, she knows about the stage robbery, all right.
Her address is:
2670 S.W. Beula Vidta (King's Heights)
Beacon 9068
Form D Federal Writers' Project
Extra Comment Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker
Address
Subject
Manley M. Banister
2071 S.W. Park
,Date February 24, 1939
The Ghost Town of Auburn
Name and address of informant Mrs. J. N. Doane
2825 N. W. 35th Ave.
Comment:
Mrs. Doane steadfastly insisted that she knew nothing because she had
lived eight miles from Auburn instead of in it. I was using the data of a
former interview with which to guide my questioning, and the questions were
so curious to her that she asked to see the sheet. She read it and became very
displeased, and refused to give it back, saying that none of it was true and
that she wanted nothing like that in our files. I let her keep the sheet, since
we have the original in the files. However, based upon her insistence that it
bears distorted evidence, it must be valueless.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the heading given
above).