Document text
Accession no.
WPA L. C. PROJECT
Form -3
UNIT
W e?
Date received
Consignment no.
Shipped from
gaz4.4, Ceet--ezi
Label
Amount
7A
Title
Place of origin,
/.14effe-o? Collection (or Type)
Project worker
Date ///O.1/47
Project editor
Remarks
Form A Federal Writers* Project
Circumstances of Interview Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Sara B. Wrenn
Date January 13, 1939.
Address 505 Elks Building, Portland, Ore_gon (Project Office)
Subject Early Oregonian& and Local Sayings.
==lt ifflaIZZIC=MOZIE
Name and address of informant Miss Mertie Stevens
603 Sixth Street, Oregon City, Oregon.
Date and time of interview January 10, 1939. 10 to 12 noon.
Place of interview lions of informant.
Name and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with informant Dr.
Pierce, a fellow worker of the Federal Writers' Project, Portland.
Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you
Description of room, house, surroundings, etc. A large, well -kept tea-room
house, with surrounding garden. The interview took place in the living -room,
big and high-ceilinged and well furnished in the period of some 25 years ago.
Everything was in immaculate order, not only in the living -roam, but in all the
roams adjoining --parlor or reception room, dining -room, bedroom and kitchen:
even dawn in the basement, where the informant has the nucleus of an early -day
museum, the windows of which are iron -barred, since she lives in this big house
entirely alone.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the proper heading
and the number to which the material refers).
lAt L.i89/;
Form B Federal Writers' Project
Personal History of Informant Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker
Address
Subject
Sara B. Wrenn Date January 13, 1939
505 Elks Building, Portland, Oregon.
Early Oregonian& and Local Sayine.
Name and address of informant Miss Mortis Stevens
603 Sixth Street. Oregon City. Oregon.
Information obtained should supply the following facts:
1. Ancestry 6. Occupations and accomplishments with dates
2. Place and date of birth 7. Special skills and interests
3. Family 8. Community and religious activities
4. Places lived in, with dates 9. Description of informant
5. Education, with dates 10. Other points gained in interview
1. Scotch, Irish, English and Indian.
2. Oregon City. Date of birth refused, Probably about 1880.
3. Father, Harley C. Stevens. Mother, Mary Crawford Stevens. Granddaughter
of Capt. Medorum Crawford, early U. S. Military Escort and pioneer of 1842.
4. Oregon City, Oregon, always.
5. Public Schools, Oregon City.
6. Always lived at home. "No parlor tricks."
7. No special skills. Church and civic interests.
3. Congregational Church, and the social life of a small town.
9. Medium sized, with brown, graying hair, parted in the middle with a little
curl at each temple. Neatly dressed. Somewhat prim. More of the late
Victorian than modern type, with a slight catch of words in her speech.
10. Miss Stevens would seem to be more interested in acquiring and possessing
early Northwest Americana, than history of folklore.
(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
Address
505 Elks Building, Portland, Oregon.
Date January 13, 1939.
Subject Pioneer reminiscences, incidents, etc.
Name and address of informant Miss Marti° Stevens
603 Sixth Street, Oregon City, Oregon.
Text:
I don't know. I'm afraid I can't tell you very muoh. I can't think of
anything just now. Yes, Grandfather Crawford was captain in the early military
escort across the plains. There's a diary of his in either the University of Oregon
or the Oregon State College, I don't remember which. There are a lot of old papers
and manuscripts and maybe a diary boxed away in the attic, but I haven't time to
get them down. I'm a very busy person. There's so much to do, just twittering
around. I want to show you around to see my things. Some of these things came
from China and some are old pioneer things I've picked up. When we've looked
at these we'll go down to the basement. Keep your coat on, it's cold down there.
Watch your step now, the stairs are steep. These Indian baskets along the wall
here are old. That is an old Indian cooking basket; it would hold water if it
were soaked up. See the little designs on it, they all mean something, but I don't
know what. The beads in this basket are some my father secured after the big flood
of the Willamette in 1861, when a lot of Indian graves were washed out. Some of
these are Hudson Bay Company beads, the kind they traded to the Indians for furs,
and some of them --the dark blue !ones I think are beads said to have been used
in trading by Lewis and Clark. The basket is full, you see, of many sorts of
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the heading given
above).
Form C Cont'd 2.
necklets, etc., said to have been used at a very early day by various fur traders
and early explorers. Father had them all labelled once, but they are all mixed
up now. Some day, maybe, I'll find somebody who knows something about them and
can straighten them out. Yes, it's too bad to have their history lost. These
snuff boxes belonged to my grandmother Brawn, who crossed the plains in 1842. This
tortoise shell one was evidently her dress -up, go -to -meeting snuff box, and this
little round paper macho one, that is so worn it hardly shaws the picture on top,
must have been the one she used at home. See, it has a little snuff in it yet.
Who made that composite picture of steel engravings? Grandmother Stevens
amused herself making that. No, it doesn't mean anything. This long cap -gun was
one of my grandfather Medorum Crawford's, and this big, old army rifle is one he
used on the Plains. And here are his saddle bags and the various leather boxes and
bags for his accoutrement. That heavy iron chest was used by him, and this stout
leathern satchel -like thing is what he is supposed to have carried the money in to
pay off his men. I'm sorry I haven't any stories about them to tell you.
That old iron lantern up there is one my mother carried to light her on
the way to prayer meeting. It was a long time before they had any street lights
in Oregon City. Father and mother belonged to the Congregational Church, founded
here in 1844, and built in 1850. Before the church was built they mat around at
various homes.
Quilting Bees? My stars, yes, there were lots of quilting bees in the
early days, but I don't remember anything about them. Yes, and there were plenty
of revivals and camp meetings too, but being Congregationalists we never want.
I've heard them tell about them though; where therm:mid get excited and "filled
with the spirit." There was one woman mother used to tell about. She always had
Form C Cont'd 3.
a baby on her arm. She was always one to sort of lead the excitement. When the
meeting would get well under way, with everybody getting filled with the spirit,
she would turn suddenly to her meek little husband, holding out the baby to him and
shouting, "Here, pa, you hold Johnny while I go to Glory!" And then she would begin
to yell, "Glory! Glory! Everybody coma to Glory!" until she got everybody well started
up to the mourners' bench.
They used to have some funny phrases that I remember mother telling. I
suppose it was the slang of that day. One of them, evidently derisive, was "There
goes She looks like she had been beaten through hell with a soot bag."
Another, of somebody "putting on airs." "There she (or he) goes, head
up and tail arisin". And here are some more:
Full of pep: "I'm up and acomin' like a burnt boot."
Controversial fine point: "That's like splitting a hair and splitting the
splits."
Concerning waste, like throwing away food: "You'll see the time when you'll
follow the crows a mile for that."
On indecision: or delayed enthusiasm: "Don't be like Elam Barsley's sow
pulled on with the head and off with the tail."
This was a purely local saying. Elam Barsley had a saw that refused to go to the
trough to eat with the other pigs, but once they got her there, they had to pull her
way.
Another, on unsolicited aid was: "Proffered service always stinks." That
sounds something like one of Benjamin Franklin's sayings.
Though women didn't have the right to vote in the early times, mother
Form C Cont'd 4.
used to tell of how they dreaded election days; when all the men would be gone
to the polls and the Indians would come about, scaring them half to death. The
Indians never harmed them, she said, never-the-less,the women folk were afraid
of them.
Form D
Extra Comment
Federal Writers' Project
Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Sara B. Wrenn
Subject
Address 505 Elks Building. Portland. Oregon.._..
Early Oregonian& and Local Sayings..
,Date January 13, 1939.
Name and address of informant Miss Mertie Stevens
603 Sixth St.L.J2t2golSity_a_Srezin.
Comment:
It would seem from Miss Stevens' antecedents and her interest in the
material things of early Oregon that she mould have more of a knowledge of pioneer
life and folklore, and the interviewer is inclined to think that an intimate
acquaintance or old friend would be able to obtain more information. It will be
noted that she mentions diaries and manuscripts in existence but, though the
interviewer called on appointment, the informant seemed to have social engage-
ments, with a good deal of "twittering about," as she expressed it. This left the
impression much remained untold when the interview ended.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the heading given
above).