Document text
loaldus TACIriold 1.
Recorded in
Writer's' Section Files
__A4E5f.r14.1_
solorLING BETTER FOR KY BOATE:
f
"Our shed opened up again this week, the last week in
January. Three big abode opened the same time. Now all the
big ones are going again, but some of the little ones are still
shut. They all shut down for a few weeks after Christmas.
That's the winter lay-off. Now they'll go through to Decoration
Day. After that's the spring lay-off, a few weeks, a month
maybe, sometimos more. It's hard to lose time like that. It'S
good for a man to rest up, but it taCree the money you got saved
to live on.
nothing coming in the money goes damn fast*
"Our shed is small. Only seven or eight men, and the boss
wor::s like the rest of us. I've worked in the big sheds, but
I just soon be where I am now. Sverything goes easier, smoother,
seems to me. The boss is one of us* He makes more money, sure,
but he's just another stonecutter. Eels a good man too, and
without saying anything he has us working hard to keep up with
him. The last day we worked before Christmas he brought down
four gallons of wine. a knocked off early and all drank to-
gether. That makes a good feeling. All drinking and laughing
an(1 singing together, telling stories and arguing, happy to-
zether with the good' tante and good feeling of the wine. You
don't get much of that in the big places.
"Of course with us we don't have lust one job to do, like
in the big sheds. e have to help each other out. Vie don't
have a saw, so we get the blocks sawed at Berolini's. Lhen
tley core in here we maybe all help chain them up for the
r)
derrickmun to move and aet tlem down in place. Then the surface
cutters take them. I started on the surface -cutting machine,
but I'm a carver too now. I still do some of the surface-cutt-
inc here two or tree of us handle that end of it. That means
workine thf) stone down to an even level. It's heavy cuttine
and it throws up a lot of dust. After it's evened down it goes
to the polishing machine, unless you want a rough-hamered fin-
ish on It. The polisher shines it off smooth as elass. Then
if it's a sandblast lob it toes to the sandblast ran, and they
carve and letter it by air -pressure blowine an abrasive against
the stone. If they want finer work it comes to us carver*,
and we use the pneumatic chisels on it. In the old days the
cl:.isel1ni- was all by 'lava.
"we've got our own blacksmith, he helps with other work
too, when he's not too busy at the faro). he has to keep an
ado on all the steel used for cuttiney It's quite a trick to
heckt them Nat rieht and hamer them out to a Good cuttine 040
aeain. Then with the finiziled piece anybody who's not too busy
helps on the lumping and boxine, and when the derrick seta it
on the flat -car or truck —whichever way it's shipped —it's
ready to eo, raybe it eoes anywhere in the country. It eoes
way off to aome cemetery we're never going to see. hut we
foreet about It, sure. There's always more pieces to cut.
There's always more people dyine.
"I went to the fights the other night. They weren't very
good, but the Armory was full of people. It's a good town for
sports like that. They hold the fights every two or three
weeks, and they always Let Good crowds. They've had some pretty
3
good boys here, but this lust card wasn't much. Sometimes they
get boys from a stable in Portland, Maine, and they're good
fighters. This time they had a couple fellows from Fort Ethan
Allen. Soldiers. I guess they could scrap if they were in
condition, but it looked like they'd been drinking before the
fights. ..uite a bunch came over from the Fort, all celebrating,
you know. The boxers must've had some, too. Those soldiers
would fight like hell for a minute or so, and then they were
done. Their wind was gone, their legs was gone... They had
ate, though. They stayed in there and took their licking.
And they both took an awful beating, tool They were all Cut
up, bleeding, and pretty sick soldiers when they got through...
About the best part of the exm was the first bout. They put
these two little kids on, and they were good. Afterwards the
crowd threw coins in the ring for them. The kids must've picked
up four -five dollars apiece anyway.
"Time before this our middleweight Eeja, showed he had
no cuts, i4) was fighting a niuer from Portland. Yela wouldn't
fight. he just covered up, clinched, hung on for his life.
Kola's been a hero here, too, but the crowd got disgusted that
night. They booed him awful, and he deserved it. re was scared
and yellow. That nigger made him look awful bad.
"All these local boys turn out like that. They get swelled
heads, you know. They get to running round with a bum crowd,
they start drinking and going with the wrong kind of girls.
Pretty soon they're all done, licked. You can't tell them any-
thing, they won't listen.
,:eja got to thinking he was good,
a bigshot. Once he might have gone somewhere in the ring. Now
4
he'll end up right here hank,inz round the poolrooms and beer
joints. I knew Keja's old man, he was the same way. Big -headed,
smart, cocky. No was a stonecutter, a good man too, but he'd
never listen to anybody. Le died of topb.„ wouldn't take care
of himself. But one thing I'll say for him, Old l'eja never
would've el .:it the way Young lAja did against -that nigLer.
"The toughest boys we've Eot in town aren't those you see
in the ring. They're the ones like the Callan° boys. Those
Callaaes are really toughl They aren't very big fellows, but
they're strong and quick, fast. Not afraid of anything. They
were bootleg4Ars during Prohibition. They've all been in. jail
one time or another. I've seen them lick big husky guys like
nothing. I uess they love to fight, those crazy Callanos.
They're little square -built boys with touch -looking faces and
great big hands on them.
And they knew how to use those fists.
"1 like. a good drink as well as anybody. But you can't
drink and fight in the ring. You can't drink too much and do
anything hard like that...1.4trre's a pretty good drinking town.
You can tell that from all the drinking places you see alone
Vain street, ".;turt on North :Atin down towards the stonesheds
there, with the Venetian Garden, and they're lined all the way
up through Firpo's, Silver Top, Luigi's, ano's, Barre
Restaurant, Andy's f;pa, Cellar Grillo so many you can't remember
then. ';ity out to the Louthern Tavern on south Main. Lots of
places on side streets, toc. And over in the Granite street
section around the stonesheds you can get drinks in plenty of
privute heuses if they know you. And you can get ewe real
fine Italian foods, to. As geed as anywhere there is. Stone-
cutters are hard -drinking men. All men who do hard dangerous
work are drinkers and like a good time. I've seen a lot of
good stonecutters go to hell from drieking. But some of them
say they'd rather go from drink than from the dust...
"Btonecutters like sports, excitement, something doing.
They like to bowl, shoot pool, gamble, everything like that.
They've Lot real blood in their veins and muscles in their
bodies... Lut most of them are good family men, and generous
hearted fellows, too generous sometimes.
an Irishman. My wife says I got the map of Ireland
on my face, and I guess she's right. I. married an Italiawgirl
here. My folks came over from Ireland, some place outside of
Dublin. They stopped in New York. One of my brothers is a
cop down there now. Fe liked New York and stayed there, but
the rest of us wanted to get away. Vy father was a stone mason.
he took us to Boston and he worked in the ,,uincy stonesheds
awh le. I was still lust a kid. nen we left Ireland I was
a baby. !fy folks had some hard times there, and my father never
spoke of Ireland. But my mother was always talking about the
blue mountains and the lakes, and she never stopped loving it.
She was always singing Irish songs around the house. he died
in .xincy,
"My other brother and I learnt the stone -cutting trade
there, and then my brother went to Naine to work. My father
and I came up to Barre. Fe had friends here, and hare he worked
until he died.
"That must've been twenty yehrs ago anyway. I've been
work here ever since. In our shed we've got all kinds of
a.
nationalities. The boss is Italian, and there are two more
Italians, a Spaniard, a Ccotchman, a Swede, and another Irish-
man besides me. Zometimea a couple French fellows work with
us when businesa is fast. It's funny but we don't have any
trouble. They're all pretty good fellows, that's why. The
granite business has got to be more important than nationality.
If a man's a real man it don't Latter what nationality he is
unlesn he's an Englishman& I learnt to ;Alta the nglish
from my fat:_er. But I think now, if an I3nglishman came into
or thads and ho was a good scuare man, I wouldn't hold any
.fwainL:u againat him.
'%,e'vo got a boy and a girl, both in high school. I wish
I could send them to college, but I don't see how.. I told the
girl to take a business course so she could go into an office.
'flat way she don't need college, she can Let a good job with-
out it. l'or the boy it will be harder. There's too many men
in t.11, world today. That's what Germany and rusaia think too,
I cv.eac. Too ma -y men, not enough :obs,
"!:y boy wants to take up aviation now. ;4 wife don't like
t:e idea, but I think you'd better let a boy do what he wants
to do. Lricl flying is getting bigger all the time. If he wants
to fly, and he can get into It, I won't try to stop him. It
never car -13 into Lis head to be a stonecutter like his father
and crandfatLar. I glad he don't want to cut stone. Not
that I'm ashamed of my trade. I'm proud of it.
"nut for my boy I want cm:lathing better, you know, the
way any man does for his son. That's Why I don't mind the
hard work, I'd work Larder and longer if it'd mean more money
7.
coin. Our shed is pretty cold and damp in the wintertime.
The floor is dirt and the wind blows through the walls. I've
cot a hernia that botllers me bad sometives. If it wasn't for
my farl m iht start hitting the bottle like some of the
boys dos and let everythinc slide. But they keep me coinc all
riht, and I'll work as long as I can. I don't want my boy
to 1:avr to work like this all h;ls life."