Document text
Accession no.
UNIT
Form -3
Date received
/0//0/510
Consignment no.
Shipped from
Label
Amount
Collection (or Type)
Title
--VT2i. CL- knit
Place of origin /(5?. 1LODate2/2
Project worker _ 62214-0-M/121
Project editor
Remarks
..1?
147 1224
Form A
Federal Writers' Project
Circumstances of Interview fttks Progress Administration
Name of worker
Address
Subjeot
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Sara B. Wren.
Date February 2. 19394
505 Elio Buildinif> Portland, OrRenn-
Pioneer Reminispepce§ and ;incid9nts,,
Name and address of informqnt Mrs. Annie Cason Lee
Date and time of intervi
Upper Drive, Lake Grove, Oswego, Oregon
January 31, 1939 2:00 to 3:00 P. MI
Place of interview Home of informant.
Name and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with informant
Nei2:hbor of interviewer.
Name and address of person, if any, aocompanying you
111•11.1•
Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.
Small country home, overlooking Lake Oswego. The room in which
the interview took place was the living room, which was comfortably though
not luxuriously furnished. The floor was covered with linoleum, and the
room was heated by a circulating heater of mall type. There was an over-
stuffed davenport and several overstuffed chairs, with a couple of floor
lamps. The garden was somewhat run-down, owing to the ill health of the owner.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the proper heading
and the =maw to sohich the material refers).
Form B Fedora/ Writers' Pi.oject
Personal History of Informant Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLEtOGRE STUDIES
Name of worker Sara B. Wrenn Date February 2. 1939.
Address 505 Elks Buildina. Portland. Oregon.
Subject Pioneer Reminiscences and ',widen*
Name and address of informant Mrs. Annie Cason Lee
Upper Drive, Lake Grove, Oswego, Orern.
Information obtained should supply the following facts:
1. Ahcestry 6. Occupations and accomplishments with dates
2. Place and date of birth 7. Special skills and interests
5. Family 8. Community and religious activities
4. Places lived in, with dates 9. Descrintion of informant
5. Education, with dates 10. Other points gained in interview
•••••••••••011•11.,
1. Scotch, English and French.
2. Portland, Oregon, December 12, 1870.
3. Father, Hilary Cason; Mother, Delilah Enminger Cason.
4. Portland from birth until present date.
5. Public Schools; Willamette University, Salem, Oregon.
6. Housewife.
7. No special skill in anything; average interest in general matters of
national and community importance.
8. Community garden club and society. Member of Christian Science Church.
9. Short, and dark in coloring, with dark gray hair. Somewhat commonplace
in appearance, though cordial. Neatly dressed.
10. Cooperative, and willing to give information, but apparently unable to
understand the nature of material desired. Mrs. Lee's husband, a retired
businessman, who was present, was more understanding and very helpful.
(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 Sara B. Wrenn Date February 2, 1939.
Address 505 Elks Building. Portland. Oregpna
Subject Pioneer Reminiscenees and Incidents, etc.
Name and address of informant Mrs. Annie Cason Lee
Upper Drive, Lake Grove, Oswegp, Oregon.
Text:
My parents, who crossed the plains to Oregon in 1853, were originally
from Kentucky. They then had five children, of which one was my sister Miranda.
She WAS a very beautiful girl, quite young. I think not more than fifteen. I
remember hearing them tell (There were twelve of us and I was one of the younger
ones born in Oregon) of an outstanding incident of their trip, in the Snake
river country. The Indians, while not yet utterly hostile, were not very friend-
ly, with tactics that harassed and worried the emigrants considerably. Every
once in a while a bunch of mounted braves would bear down upon the train and
demand tribute of anything that took their fancy. It seemed my father had a
specially good knife of the hunting or skinning variety. He had this knife in
his hands, doing something with it, when one of the Indians, a chief, or at
least the leader of his gang, reached down and snatched it out of his hands.
Of course there was nothing the white men could do under such circumstances, put,
as the saying now is, grin and take it. In that case, however, it was the Indian
who took. Then the Indians caught a glimpse of this pretty sister of mine. They
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the heading given
above).
Mrs. Annie Cason Lee
Form C 2.
decided they wanted her too. They offered to buy her, however, and it took a
lot of diplomacy and tact to get out of a most unpleasant situation, and from
that time on whenever Indians came in sight, Miranda was hidden down in a little
hole they arranged for her, in the bottom of the wagon. As you can imagine, such
a way of hiding was far from comfortable for Miranda at times. It WAS when they
were fording the Snake River that mother and the children had a terrifying ex-
perience, that, looking back at it from today, seems strange. They reached the
fording place late in the day, and, awing to the near by annoying Indians, were
anxious to get on the other side without delay. When the wagons crossed
the women and children being floated across in wagon boxes, made water -proof for
that purpose mother and her children were left on the bank, to be carried
over later. In the crossing there was trouble with the stock, and other things
of an unforeseen nature happened, and before it was realized darkness had settled
dawn and there was mother and her little folk, with no food and no protection
from the cold, and unfriendly Indians lurking in the background. To attempt to
cross the river, cold and swift as it was, in the darkness, was suicide. There
WAS nothing to do but wait till morning, with what feelings may be imagined.
Mother always said it was nothing but her trust in God that helped her live
through that awful night, as the children and she crowded close together for
warmth and comfort, in a silence that formed their only protection from the red-
skins. At the break of day, of course, they were rescued.
It was late in the autumn when they arrived in Portland, where they
camped on what is now the block just north of the civic auditorium.
Father WAS a stone mason. Be took up a donation land claim in what
is now Montavilla, one of his boundary lines running east for a mile along the
Base Line, and then one mile north.
Mrs. Annie Cason Lee
Form C 3.
Father aid mother were both very religious, but they were Southerners
and they, or at least father had the fiery southern temper. Mother WAS a charter
member of the Centenary Methodist church on East Stark, which was organized at
our home at East Sixth and Pine streets. This recalls a story that father never
liked very much being reminded of, but the family always, in after years, got
quite a laugh out of it. The incident occurred sometime after the Stark Street
ferry was in operation under Captain Foster, who was quite a friend of father's.
Father, with one of my older sisters was going over to the Taylor Street Methodist
Church. They were descending the ferry slip, and were all ready to step aboard
the ferry, when the boat pulled out suddenly, leaving them standing there and
already late for church. Father MRS furious. He was short and thick -set, with
a bull -like neck, and when he was mad he was awful mad. He shook his fist at
Captain Foster, up in the pilot -house, and, I guess, Captain Foster must have
laughed, for when he returned to the east bank, father was madder than ever and
didn't hesitate to let the world know. The men exchanged ugly words, and one
thing led to another, until finally they were at it, hammer and tongs. Foster
tried to stick his thumb in father's eye, in good old frontier -fight fashion, and
father grabbed the thumb in his mouth and bit it nearly off. By this time there
was a big bunch of spectators, and of course they interfered and separated the
two men, and Father, still sputtering, finally returned home, all torn and bloody,
and far from looking the respectable, Christian church attendant who had left the
house an hour or so earlier. You'd have thought those two men mould have been
enemies ever after, but they weren't. The next morning, when father boarded the
ferry, he said "Hello, Cap", and Captain Foster grinned and responded, "Hello, Cas",
and that was the end of it.
Mrs. Annie Cason Lee Form C 4.
Father never drank, but he came of a race of drinking men, and he
must have liked the taste of liquor. Anyway he was afraid of it. During his
life -time he always kept a diary. There were a lot of these in mother's
possession after his death. If I had them I could give you a priceless- store
of folklore and anecdotes, but mother made me promise to burn them at her death
and I did. I think one reason she wanted them destroyed was father's frequent
allusion to being tempted of the devil. Over and over again this entry occurred,
"Tempted of the devil today." Once, when he was custodian of a warehouse where
liquor was stored, the odor was almost too much for him, so I have been told, and
he ggt down on his knees and prayed for strength to resist the temptation. Well,
since he did resist, I think those entries, "Tempted of the devil today," are
-something to be proud of, and I've sometimes been sorry I destroyed the diaries.