Document text
Form A Federal Writers' Project
Circumstances of Interview Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker lilker Winslow Date Nov. 28, 1838
Address TOW SW Fart, Portlwado Oman
Subject Folklore (i4ang) Hardrook Mining
Name and address of informant HARM dimms. Odd nalswee Hams.)
SE 38nd Belgate St., Portland, Oregon
Date and time of interview Nov. TO, 1950. From 10 in the morning until 2 PM,
Place of interview Mr. Skate' roam at the 044 Pillows' Memo.
Name and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with informant
Howard Corning, 400 Elk. Bldg.
Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you none
Description of room, house, surroundings, etc. The Odd Fellows' home for *14
people oocupies large grounds and consists of too vell.wkept briek buildings, of
four or five stories each. I was shown around the institution by the Superintendent
and the entire establishment is clean, modern, and nicely furnished. Each of the
residents hes a private room and it was in lank Simms' room that I oonducted the
interview. The furnishings of this roomwere tem chairs, a bed, and a chest of
drawers. There were no pictures on the wells and but a few of Mr. Unmet belong-
ings an the dresser. Everything was very orderly and it was evident that Hank Simms
doesn't belong to that school of elders who go in for 'motto interior decoration.
In spite of the comparative bareness of the roans one felt at hone.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the proper heading
and the number to which the material refers).
Form B
Federal Writers1 Project
Personal History of Informant Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLIURE STUDIES
Name of worker ilialker *imam
Address $009 allryalk, Portland. Orman
Subject Polklorts (21nint)
Date Novo ft. 19118
Name and address of informant HOLOg Ram. Odd Wens, Homo* Um& Maigotigie
ftrtiands OMNI
Information obtained should supply the following facts:
1. Ancestry 6.
2. Place and date of birth 7.
3. Family 8.
4. Places lived in, with dates 9.
5. Education, with dates 10.
Occupations and accomplishments with dates
Special kills and interests
Community and religious activities
Description of informant
Other points gained in interview
(1). Mr. Hank Simms is an old type of westerner and resents having his family
affairs pried into. Ho does, however, in the course of ordinary waver*
sation, reveal many of the answers necessary to the above questions. His
father, Henry Thitton Simms, was born in Illinois, in 1825, and oame West in
the gold rush of 'fortrmaine. Later he took up a donation claim two miles
north of the (2) town of Willamina, and it was there Hank Simms was born in
the year of 1852 (3). About the rest of his family and his early years on
the homestead, Mr. Simms was uncommunicative and vented to get an to talk
of mining, in which I had told him I was interested. Question four (S) is
answered by Mr. Simms' *1 aim that he has lived in practically every mining
town from Alaska to Mexico. (5) is as yet unanswered, but Simms is a
remarkably literate man
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the proper heading
and the number to which the material refers).
Add, Sim* Pone Dip
2.
(6) mr. awe is a miner and haw wort& in every type of motel but tunsten, end
at '4j position in the nines frau laborer to superintendent. (7) Ur. Striae
special skills and intermits are thine, eannested with romnr geology, etc. (8)
r. nimme is an atheist and from his present residence it ean be asoumed that he
was an Odd ?pillow. (9) At 06. lank Ammo has the appearance of a man twenty years
younror, end his only infirmity seems to be a little weakness in the legs. He is
tell and sonewhet handsome men, olesupshaven. "Pith oleo, eyes and a steady
oonntenanoe that st time* veers an ironic sort of smile. When he loads his pipe
you natio*1 with surprise, that his hands are steady and rrom the clearness of his
state, and the delivery of his epoAPh. you have a hard tine bringing yourself to
believe in his age.De has all of his own teeth and though they are,worn they
seam strong and grip his pipe '01th some detemnination4 Els might is about one
bunttred end ninety, and he is still s powerful men and one whose body-hes net been
broken by labor, but built by it. The henrini: is good and, esospt for lapses
there seems to be no flow in his memory. (10) One or tha signifioant thIns
a ont the nen is his honesty about his present position1 mul ha says that he ean+
not see ehy a person "dm was unsuccessful enourh to end up in a hone for the aged
should be of interest to anybody, or why anythinj he sould say should seam important.
It would be the Impreselon of this interviewer that Mr. Simms is an estremely
reliable somee of infewmations he is remarkably free from any biases that night
color his pictures of the pest. Sine, he harbor, no bitterness. his remarks on
others can be riven some validity. When a person still livinc might be hurt by
enythinr he has to say, he refuses to give the proper names nil* Sinne is the
finest type of old 'Postern nen.
Form C Federal Writers? Project
Text of Interview (Unedited) Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Walker Winslow Date Sava 29* ma
Address 2029 Si Parks Portland* Qr.galli
Subject FOlklore (miadm4)
Name and address of informant Anak Slam* Odd fillsos" Sono* 52nd
Holgato, Portland, Oregon
Text: I was introducod to Monk Simms by the Superintendent or the Moms Ind ho
took no to his roes. At ono* Hank Simms asked, "Nall, young fallow, shat do
you vont just sons straight running off at the mouth or do you want no to
guide on something 'postal? I am a long distance talker if you give no a chanos
and 1 might take you for a long ride in this wrong dirsotion. I told Mr* Stoma
that I was interested in anything that he wanted to talk about, but that know
a little about Wain,., and we night as well start an that. "I reckon you do
know little about /-1114;ng," he said, "1 have followed it for fifty or sixty
years and dug a shaft straight into this poor house* You can't osll that very
good mining* Minor's is tools end I'll hot that for every dollar lifted off
the bedrock an this want, two has been mink book in the gams* Minors are liars,
too, honest liars* If you question a minor's word about the claim he's work...
ine you might as wall question his daughter's virtu** That is the say they stand
by their lies* I have lied sone tall ono* in my days and thAmit hos been millions
struck in this old hoed that no mon will over woe That's how I got mbar*I om*"
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the heading given
above).
Add Lin:ta ?orti C.
At about this point fh the conversation Mr. tom asked no if I was
relizious, when I assured him that I was not he continued by saying, *Well.
then I osn talk as I vent and kind of lot loos.. Miners are God -damned tools
end I Noon one of the worst. I have alined everything that they have in the West
swept tungsten, maybe, and so if there is spy speeial k rid of foolishnees you
want to hear about, what is it?"
asked Mr. Simms what sort of minim; he did first. He said, "First
time I lit out from the homestead it was to do bewail mining in Southern Oregon.
I'd take a run at it, starve out, and then go home until I got fed up enough to
try another run. /t was akippy mining; blot* sand, fins as flour, with gold in
it so fins you eouldn't eoe it with the naked eye. It was hard to'oeteh and had
a lot of platinum, in it that we throw away in those days worth fifty -sixty
dollars an ounce now, but we wouldn't have no traffics with it than.. There ma
two typos of bawl. m4nAllg. Ono was with a hoppor and screens they mulled that
a Long Tan, but I never worked ono so I (wouldn't tell you nmeh about it. The
other was old, coast sluicing. 14 didn't uso regular sluice riffles but the
frayed ends of the planks in the joints served for that. The Assay timber was
just right for fins gold. No one ever got rich et beach miming that I know of,
and them stories you hear about fold washing up an the tide are all bull. This
gold washed in on the tide, settled in pockets in the mike and then, it stayed.
If you worked it out you had to wait till more settled. I know two men to take
forty dollars a plaice in one moraine, and worked out a couple of po.lketa it would
take the tide two yof,ra to fill again. No one knows muoh about that kind of
mining except that it is the poorest there is. Tha:: is the last of it I did.
"George Cotlins. the Indian a,ent or the Aloes Indian resorvation, was
the boat beach miner there was, &A he and his two half*breed sons used to do
to Form C. 3.
pretty well, but they never got rioh at it. Hi mined for thirty or forty years
and had beach mining down to perfection. Tho tide spreads the gold and there
can't be any rieh pookots like you find it the foot of an eroded mountain. I
tAnk that the platinum lay in soma eurfsee formation in the °oast mountains,
for there wee a let of it in them days, but don't know whorl it has gone now.
If T did I wouldn't be in the poOTheue. talking to you. I quit beach mining
satly and went south to some of the California digging..
l'I am a hardrvok man and I learned m' business at Kermit, California—.
up in the ?leather River Country. That was a big diving* and some of the beet
of the old hands worked there. I learned from the ground dean. You don't learn
from the pound ç, in tat business. I ova timber and out my awn steel e•
(would before I was twentrifive. A man had to know his business then and a
foreman could tell a greenhorn like reading bee from a poor ox. You didn't
ask a foreman how to do anything., no told you 'go ahead and if it doesn't
suit me you'll know it'. NO one over got fired in that,* days. If amen got
eritioised he knew enough to quit. There was none of this sucking around you
have now, and anon didn't hang onto a job like a priest to a pariah. leer
ono* in a while he just drug down on principal and went down the road. They'd
call us hobos now I guess, but in than dove we was celled Overland Johns and,
by God, I know ever Greek and oow between here and Mexico and right back up to
Alaska. You see what it has got me, but that was the bay we lived in than,
days, and if you eas a mining man there wasn't no other rri around. They didn't
hire the homsguard and if you stayed long in one plaee that is what you got to
be. I'll give you an example, and it wean't so lonc, ago either. I drifted into
Cornioopia one night on the late stage e• just out shakinc the smell ef Portland
ofY! myself ee and I dropned into a blimd pig to werm up a littlo. som not a
to ts Fora C 4.
dr17.it nr non but V. bartender there eoule nee 1 yes an old overiendor, and he
rrinned at tbe sight of mos We didn't talk much and onion woe leaAng to go
to the hotel to bed he asked no, "Lookin for a job old. timer?' I told hie
thet we the idea. Tie says, well you go Gee so and $o in tbe norninc,, be went*
a man. *What's your nmmele I told him and gent on to bed. The newt morning
I gent around to see the uy ho to:d me about and ho asked me a hell of a lot
of'quentions about who I know and *KATO 1 gorksd, and I told him so much as
'wanted him to knows t ,culd see that the lob wee in highgrade and that he
vented to kociewho be elms hiring. Well he ems just about to paint my aback
for me, otos here mimes thet bertonder, and he says °Say, r4p an flt, won't you
hirinf this Jan* This is Fronk Ame, he don'tamountte nothing and never will,
but he is a hard rook from wey boek sod co tirht you hnvo to tekc a tau pound
ole,;?ze to drive a drill tight In this sense moans a clean minor one who
leaves littl. ere behind. (The al'usion here is unprintablo). You're hired,'
so sue $0o ewe. well, handled some of the steepest bighgrede you ever seen
Per that man, I have seen tho ttne we pulled down a stand or hIchcrads t at
voul rum 800 ouneen or silver to the ton, and marbo 300 gold. I don't Wank
the nen ever vetehod no. 1A, trusted no mad t-st gale thin kind of hichgrode you
handle in canvas so none t will leek sluts That bartender's word ws bettor
than r down's,
had a Lwede workinc with ale that couldn't leave that hichgreds
Alone. !le was an honest men I moon but there les just too damned much hich.
grad* %bare !Or him to stfind up under. The Whatin man straight beak in the
mountain mud this highgrode ore oano in °loops over so often. The vey you de
Add SiMMB Form C 5
with it is leave it bonging work around it till you get in ordinary dirt
again. That way the super can goo it and know you aren't highgrading him*
(Righgrading is steeling ore when it pays to cart it off). One dey we ran
around a hanging of rich stuff and finished it off at waiting time* I alleys
ammo out of tha tunnel but Olo couldn't seem to drag himself =my and about
the time I gat outside knew he had weakened* I hoard a crash and the Swede
had brought down the hanging. When he mos out he said, "We can pick it up
first thing in the morning and we won't have to kook it down." An hour later
the super can around end said. "Ole. I mm going to him to ley you off. Your
a good man but got to ley samisen* off and it might as well be you* I ma
going down the hill tonight and you can go with we for eompeely." You aouldn't
leave that Swede and that highgrado in the same *aunty and the super knew it.
HO didn't blame the awed', and he walked down to town with him to keep him
host. I have been too Oc&damnod honest. Ample used to sell me Bluest !link
Simms. Thor ought to have said, "There goes honest Ma* SIMMS an the way to the
poorhouse."
"Besides highgrading there was a lot of salting end crooked assaying
went on in the early days sm.- still does. I guess. I an a lot of it sow
of those highbindors brought ore samples clean from blexieo to salt an Oregon
mine with, and a man that had ever worked this country would know it was foreign
or., but people are prone to b., fools that's why we got plisses like this. I
didn't open my mouth about it many times for the chances are that the man eho
was mlniy+g on a salted claim had jIst as moth dhanes as he would moy pleas else.
If he had to be digging a tunnel it didn't make much difforenee ehere, just so
it vas a mining country. That was worse was the crooked assayers. You'd take
Add Simms Form C 8
you wimples to them and they'd pitch them out the book door and toll you whet
they had been paid to tell you that your or. was worth, says seventy
eighty dollar's a ton. You take them a pima of highgrade and they'd tell you
the same ting: ?here was a way to get around theta, though, and I showed more
than one mui how to do it. You'd take a half dozen samples and put then in
six numbered envelopes and than take a half demon envelopes that were empty,
and when you got in the office of the assayer you split the samples between the
envelope* and told him you were going to have to Government shock on him, but
that you wanted a hurryiwup fogey. You'd seer. the Jesus out of him that way
and he mould be as honest as he was able. Most assayers were drunkards and had
tho jimmies so bed that they didn't kneerwhat they were doing. I saved one man Es
I won't give you his name a lot of money that way. When I tell you &out him
you'll wonder why I did it. He we. as big a fool as I am. Hs railroaded forty
years here in this state, starved his fenny, and spent every sent he made an
nine*. The only thing that ever paid him was the pension he had spent forty
years staking a slate on. Miners are fools, bay all of them...
*Take the imqr they pliable. sew one poor pleat of a cousin Jai*
that's a Cornishman come into a plass with not enough clothes on him to flag
a handcar. MO put his last dollar down on the double 0 on the wheel in a
gambling hall, and it hit. He was drunk and so the dealer said 'let it lay'.
Dollble 0 pays thirty six to one. To did and, by God, he hit her. The house
didn't have enough money to pay him more than eighteen handfed dollars. In
three days all Cousin Jack had was the jimmies and no breakfast, and the newt
I saw him he was a bu'l cook in a Merman °amps happy, said as soon as he made
a stoke be was going prospecting. A real miner never goes prospecting until be
has to beg or earn his grubstake the hard way. Tie d no more take mining money
and do that than a Catholic mould shave with Holy waiter. I was a little different
Add Simms Porn C 7.
but you see ghat it has got me. Beer time I start to get vise you point out
to me vivre I am. I'll toll you a story of a model sem, though yo:_ know
the kinds never drink or gbles They go to ohuroh every Siandiy and pr oy svlor
once in a while. Good men it's just their way. I whored around they
vent to church.
*Well this one model man had a elaim in about a mile of mine, down
ik Southern Oregon. forty years ago. Be worked it hard and kept his news
Glean mad Wore the diving& brake up he sold it for a thousand dollars. The
rest of us stayed till the diggings played out. I figure that men would ammount
to something. When last I hoard of him !so was an honest farmer, doing a little
mining on the side, and raisin; a family. When I came in here I was sitting
down in the hall one day umitinr for someone and there vas an old *Dodger sitting
newt to me mad ve got to talking. Be knew something about Southern Oregon, and
so we swapped MAPOO beak and forth to see who could stir up the most live mos.
Finally I played the model man at him. I says, *Save you ever heard what happened
to Cliff Paine, he must b I deacon by now and rich.* I was talking to Cliff
Pains. You went to call on him, he'll tell you the Other aid* of the story.
Hes here in the poorhouse.
In questioning Mr. Simms I learned that he had worked in ovory mine
in Oregon, almost, and that he has a remarkable memory, if you oak him about
a specific Woe« Rs thinks that with the aid of an outline nap he oould place
most of the famous Nine.. BS worked in Sumpter in its later days, but didn't
think much of the plasm or its one*horee smelter. Hs Mould be talked to am
specific subjects, as information is needed. Though quite willing to talk he
isn't a man who is given to wild statements concerning things that should be
be kept it the rears of the reasonable. When I asked him ahout the lingo of the
hardrook miners be said that I would have to 'pan it out of his talk', that he
Add SIMMS AWN C
8.
oouldn't give it to Aa. le has quit* a knowledge of geology and a good
vocabulary. In summing up mining he said that it was a guessing gams, and
that in the and it 'didn't spoil anything.' Ai an illustration he point-.
ed out instances eminent getting their leads frmn slairvoyants. His last
bi job was up in Canada, where he quit beoause he 'could pitch a biscuit
out the kitchen door wad hit agiacior.'
sa going to continue the intarvicw.
Form D Federal Writers' Projoot
Extra Comment Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Walker Winslow ,Date Nov. 29, 1088
Address 2049 SW Ptlirk• Peramindo Oregon
Subject
relkiore (Mining)
Name and address of informant Mink Simms, Odd Fellow' Mime
32nd Holgete, Portland, Oregon
Comment: Mr. Simms is one of eighty residents in this home for aged people, end
if he is a good sample of the rest of the residents the gime should he avalAmible
souroe of material. One of the requirements for entranee into the home is a
long residence in this stet's and the type of people eligible for the hem are
of good sound middlrelsse stock. They hove kept up their lodge dues and livid
in one place long enough to know it veil. Mt. Simms' references to the plow
as a poorhouse are a touth of his own, and it is doubtful if he really thinks
he is in one. It is merely his way of lifting the pleee out of the ordinary.
There are et least two other residents with mining backgrounds. Also there
are 26 women. Interviewing is simple beoause of the privacy allowed by the
private rooms mad the eagerness of the people to talk to someone from the out
side. Mr. Simms, as has been pointed out elsewhere is a valuable store of
taformstion on, mines and nininc. Been at his adveneed age people still some
to htm for advice. 114 is going to give me the names of other people in his
business.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the heading given
above).
Add simls Fora D. 2,
uhile interviewing Mr. Simms, and listening to him toll about the
workman of the old West, it struck me that such men are most likely to be
found in plaoes like the Odd Fellows home. The majority of men who worked
in the mines and construotion clamps of the early days are not the type who
now own property and him en incomes Indeed it would have gone against their
samples to hese acquired either. As Mr. Simms says, they were journeymen
who 1 okod on a long residenoe in one plies as a sign of weakness. By musing
from job to job where they either had to "put up or shut up", they, were kept on
their toes and the men who could walk into any oamp, take any job, and handle
it skillfully was a men to be looked up to. A great deal of the solar in these
men's lives consisted of doing that. It was in this way that Mr. Simms booms
a toel dresser (all hamilmx*rdners in the early day* out their own steel) a
timber man, powder man, assayer, preotioal engineer, end an all around mining
nen. All of the stories be told me had as their dramatic, climax the journer
TJleits skill in triumph over the homeguard, greenhorn, or "high collar".
Obviously the day of such a man has passed, and passed many years
back, end so there is little to discredit such a man for beine in a home for
the aged, If he, end his kind, had followed the economic precepts of the
righteous souls who hive had the funds to endow historical institutions and
publish msnoirs, the West would not have boon built. It seems to this inter*
viewer that mr. Simms represents a portion of the folk life that is as import-
ant as that of his homec;uard brethern, and that his kind should not be penalised
because of their lack of frugality and righteousness.