Matewan Oral History Project Collection
Sc2003-135

Mattie Allara Interview

Becky Bailey: June 12th 1989. This is Becky Bailey from the Matewan Development Center. I'm in the home of Mrs. Frank Allara. And we're going to talk this afternoon about life in Matewan and her personal history. I guess the first question I really should ask you Mrs. Allara is what is your given name and what was you maiden name?

Mattie Allara: Uh...my maiden name is Mattie Ruth McCoy.

B: Okay. Can you spell that for me?

MA: M.A.T.T.I.E.

B: Okay.

MA: Ruth McCoy. M.C.C.O.Y

B: Okay. And when were your born?

MA: 1904.

B: Were your parents from this area?

MA: Yes.

B: Okay. And who were they...

MA: Well my father was, my mother was from Logan County.

B: And who was your father?

MA: Sailor McCoy.

B: Okay. And how did you spell that?

MA: S.A.I.L.O.R. The way you spell sailor.

B: Okay. And your mother was from Logan County?

MA: Yeah she's a Buskirk.

B: Okay.

MA: Emma Buskirk.

B: Okay. How did they meet?

MA: Uh?

B: How did they meet?

MA: She came visiting to her uncle's home. He lived across the railroad.

B: Okay.

MA: Where Robert McCoy lives now and she came to visit her uncle.

B: Okay. And when did they marry?

MA: 1902.

B: Do you have any brothers and sisters?

MA: Well they was thirteen in all. We had more girls than we did boys. Lets see let me think of the boys first...

B: Okay.

MA: Five boys and the rest of them girls.

B: Okay. Were they older than you or younger than you?

MA: Now I'm next to the oldest.

B: Okay. Was the oldest a boy or a girl?

MA: A boy.

B: A boy. Okay. When all the children were born did your mother have a mid wife or a doctor?

MA: A mid wife.

B: Okay.

MA: With all of them.

B: Do you know the ladies name?

MA: Uh...Rhoda Compton. R.H.O.D.A.

B: R.O.H.D.A. Compton?

MA: Compton...C.O.M.P.T.O.N.

B: Okay. And uh...was she paid for coming to help your mother or...

MA: I presume...I don't think anybody does anything for nothing.

B: Okay. Was there a reason why your mother had a mid wife instead of a doctor that you know of?

MA: We had...she had doctor some time but uh...Mrs. Compton was always there.

B: Uh-huh. Okay. So sometimes she would help the doctor?

MA: Yeah. Well actually the doctor that uh..delivered most of us were born up here on Sulphur Creek. Uh...seven of us and uh...the rest of us born in Matewan. But the doctor at that time was her first cousin.

B: Uh-huh. And do you know his name?

MA: Doctor Goings.

B: Doctor Goings?

MA: G.O.I.N.G.S.

B: Okay. Uh...Mrs. Presley said today that she believe he died during the flu epidemic of 1918, 1919.

MA: Who did?

B: Doctor Goings. Do you know, did he....

MA: I don't remember how he left here. Now I don't know how he died. But he left here before he died.

B: Oh okay. Alright uh...lets see did uh...your brothers and your sisters and...and yourself go to school in this area?

MA: Uh..three of my went...sisters started out up here on the hill. And...in the primary grades. Then all the rest of us went to Matewan grade school, high school.

B: Uh-huh. Did all of you graduate from high school?

MA: I think uh...I'm almost sure all of them did.

B: Did any uh...continue their education? Did any go to college?

MA: Lets...two of them are regular nurses.

B: Uh-huh.

MA: Two of them are graduate nurses.

B: Uh-huh.

MA: Uh...I'm the only one that went...I didn't finish college I needed seventeen hours. To finish...I didn't finish. Had too many children.

B: How many children did you have?

MA: I had five.

B: You had five.

MA: Four boys and one girl.

B: Now when did you marry?

MA: Nineteen, twenty-nine. Almost fifty-nine years ago.

B: Oh my goodness. .......And what was your father's occupation?

MA: Well he uh...had...it was in real estate. He was a bartender when it was legitimate and when it went out in West Virginia and was legitimate in Kentucky, why they opened a bar up in uh...Kentucky across the river together.

B: Okay.

MA: And then when they went out of that he uh...just retired on his money.

B: Did he make good money as a bartender?

MA: Well he owned the bar once. But the later part when his uncle died he got the bar. Uh...I don't know he did. I imagine he made his money in real estate. He owned Blackberry City and lot of places.

B: What was the name of the bar that he inherited from his uncle do you remember?

MA: No but I got two spittoons from it sitting over.

B: Oh my goodness. Okay.

MA: I don't know the name of it.

B: Okay. Was that in Matewan?

MA: uh-huh. Out on the corner right down...you know where that...the hotel comes through...it was right there on the corner of that.

B: Okay.

MA: But not in that hotel and there was one that burnt.

B: Okay. uh...I'm assuming, correct me if I'm wrong you've been married once is that?

MA: Once is all...enough.

B: Okay. And that was to Mr. Allara?

MA: Yes.

B: Okay. Is that an Italian name do you know?

MA: Yes.

B: It is?

MA: Uh-huh.

B: Was his...was his...

MA: His father was from Italy.

B: Okay. Do you know where?

MA: No.

B: Did you know uh...your husbands father? Did you meet him?

MA: No.

B: You don't. Okay.

MA: No...I didn't know him. ......Yeah I did know his father. He's uh...yeah I know his father.

B: Okay. Did he uh...

MA: Not thinking very good. I was thinking his fathers father.

B: Oh okay. Uh...your...your father-in-law you did know your father-in-law?

MA: Yeah.

B: Okay.

MA: Yeah.

B: Uh...did he speak...

MA: But he died...he was killed before I married Frank.

B: How did that happen?

MA: He was uh...getting out of a storm, ran under a tree and lightening struck the tree and killed him.

B: Did he speak with an accent I mean could you tell that...that he was...

MA: Who Mr...

B: Your father-in-law.

MA: My oh...oh yeah he talked Italian all the time.

B: Okay.

MA: But he could speak...talk English too.

B: Uh-huh. Did the family uh...keep any Italian customs that you know of I mean did they cook Italian food or anything? (Mrs. Allara is apparently shaking her head no) No they didn't?

MA: Mother wouldn't let them.

B: Why was that? Was she an American?

MA: Well back in those days uh...to be a Hungarian or Italian was worse than being a nigger.

B: Was what?

MA: Worse than being colored.

B: Oh, okay.

MA: Back in those days.

B: Why was that?

MA: I don't know honey.

B: Okay.

MA: It's just the way people are. I guess.

B: So was uh...

MA: I guess it was because they had all the manual jobs and things around to do...

B: Okay. I...I figured as much my...my mother grew up in a coal camp. I was asking for the record so......

MA: Coal camps I guess are all like that you know.

B: Uh-huh. Was uh was Mr. Allara's father your father-in-law was he a coal miner or what did he do?

MA: He was uh...he was uh...whatever they call it, a number one stone mason. He built dams and he built that dam at uh...uh... Fort Gay. He built a lot of stone _   ____.

B: Okay. How did you and Mr. Allara your husband meet? How did...

MS: We go'd to school together.

B: Okay. And was that Matewan High School?

MA: Uh-huh.

B: Okay. Did you all date from when you were in school until you married?

MA: No. In my freshman year I went away to school. I went to Greenbrier Seminary. And spent four years in...up there one of them I took that had changed uh...junior in college and I took college work.

B: Uh-huh. Okay. uh...If you don't mind me asking why didn't you finish college? Did you come home...

MA: Oh I just had...well I had uh...two children and I was teaching school and having hired help and the little girl died. And the next uh...fall and I was pregnant when she died with my...one of my sons. So I just said I'm gonna stay home. And I stayed home 'til uh...my baby graduated from...he's in high school when I started back teaching. So that's the reason I didn't finish. I was old then.

B: When were your children born?

MA: Uh...nineteen and uh...lets see thirty, thirty-one the little girl had died. Thirty-nine, thirty-seven, and the baby that's the one when I went to school was born in forty-one, one and forty-one, and one in forty-five.

B: Okay.

MA: That's when I went back to work again. And I was there from the time...

B: And you were a teacher?

MA: I taught...I taught about six years before I married.

B: What did you teach?

MA: A primary grade as uh...well there all primary up 'til the third grade.

B: Okay. uh...what did you little girl die of?

MA: It was uh...it was the same disease that Clara Bowe had. I don't...it's something like uh...pneumonia type of death.

B: Okay. When your children were born uh...were they born at home or in a hospital?

MA: Two of them were born at home. The two oldest ones.

B: Okay. And where were the others born?

MA: They were born in Matewan hospital.

B: Okay. Why was that?

MA: I don't know. I guess cause you couldn't get anybody help ya you know.

B: Okay. uh...

MA: Just get a little more fashionable I guess.

B: Did it make any difference in...in...in...the experience of having children? (Mrs Allara was shaking her head, no.) Okay.

MA: Just as easy at home as it is any where.

B: Okay. The two that were born at home did a doctor come or was it a mid wife?

MA: A doctor?

B: A doctor.

MA: We had both them and he had a helper.

B: Okay. uh...was he the town doctor or a company doctor a coal company doctor?

MA: He...he worked for hisself.

B: Okay. And what was his name?

MA: Doctor Sanders.

B: Okay. uh...people around town I have...I haven't been here long but they say you've got to...you've got to talk to or...or talk about Frank Allara he's so important. Can you tell me a little bit about your husband?

MA: He had a hard life. When he was very uh...he was going to high school and uh...he...they kept...they moved a lot because he...where ever he had a job you know he had to go. For a stone mason. And uh...after his father got killed when he came back to West Virginia the family did, and he became uh...uh...carried cinder and things up to the mines where they were building a mines. He was a young boy in high school. He worked for twenty-five cents a day.

B: Carrying cinder blocks?

MA: uh-huh. Carrying cinder blocks up a hillside. To the top of one of these mountains.

B: Mm...and then what did he do from there on?

MA: I don't know. He worked around the mines and he worked in stores and...and finally got back in the mining business. And became superintendent for several...over several mines. And uh... then he got in the theater business.

B: uh...how did he get into the theater business? Were you all married by then?

MA: Oh yeah.

B: How did he get into the theater business?

MA: Well uh...the theater was going broke and Dan Chambers talked him into (laughing) buying it for five thousand dollars to a man that had nothing. He loaned him the money.

B: uh-huh.

MA: And the first thing you knew he had it paid for. Then bank night came by and you make it.

B: When...when did he buy the theater?

MA: Well lets see it was in the early thirties. I'm not sure exactly when cause uh...I sold tickets down there for as long... when we first bought it. I gave everybody the correct change. But then I gave them a dollar back you know. So he fired me. So I got fired. But uh...in the late thirties cause Rick and Emily were real small. And I was glad they fired me.

B: Okay. Um..how much did...did it cost to go to the movies when you all bought the business?

MA: Well uh...twenty-five was the highest I remember uh...ten and fifteen cents. And I used to go when they had a theater was a different...a different place than it was now. Uh...we'd go for five cents. Children.

B: Where was that theater?

MA: It was uh...you know uh...out in that lot away from the Buskirk building coming this way, before you get to the underpass? It was out in that area.

B: Okay. And that was back when you were younger than...

MA: Yeah.

B: Okay.

MA: It belonged to Tom Carroll then.

B: Okay. Some of the uh...question that we are suppose to ask are about building downtown uh...and what were in the buildings through the years. Uh...say in the nineteen forties I...I assume your theater was...it was your theater that was downtown. What building was that in?

MA: In nineteen forty when the theater was in?

B: Right.

MA: Well there was Hope's Department Store there was two big places over there and a Ruples eating place and bar I guess this little beer they called it. You weren't suppose to go in that.

B: Why was that?

MA: You're not suppose to go in that you know their selling beer.

B: Okay. uh...lets see what kind of things did they sell in the department stores in town?

MA: Well Hope's Department Store had everything they even had nails, pans, pots they had two sides. One of them was clothing department and one of them was just everything.

B: We're suppose to ask if there was any particular name brands of things that people would buy say back in the twenties or thirties, forties. Can you think of anything that was name brand

MA: Well uh...

B: ...that people bought a lot of?

MA: That underwear that they sell on TV. I do everything in my

B: B.V.D's...

MA: B.V.D.'s

B: Did they have B.V.D.'s back in those...

MA: Oh yeah. They had Fruit of the Loom and uh...I don't remember many things the sell cause we were really uh...after I grew up we went to Williamson to shop.

B: uh-huh. Why was that?

MA: Had better things. Bigger town and better...

B: Okay. Lets see.

MA: Shaffer Brothers store across the street but that was in nineteen, twenty uh...he had a lot of good clothes. Especially mens clothes.

B: Were there name brands that he...

MA: Huh?

B: Were there name brand clothing...was there name brand?

MA: Yeah...yeah.

B: Okay. Do you remember any of those?

MA: No I don't.

B: Okay. Okay...so how long did you all own the theater?

MA: Oh I don't remember exactly when 'til it went uh...the theater started going out. We owned several theaters out door theaters.

B: uh-huh.

MA: We owned a the...built a theater in Huntington one in Kentucky, and one, two, three little town theaters.

B: Okay. Was that uh...Mr. Allara primary business interest? Was theaters.

MA: After, yes when he just started them in.

B: Okay.

MA: They went...when they went broke he became a banker.

B: Okay. With what bank?

MA: Matewan National. He was president of Matewan National.

B: Okay.

MA: 'Til he was seventy-three years old when he retired.

B: Okay. When was that?

MA: Well he...he'll be eight-seven his birthday.

B: Okay. And did you continue working after your youngest got old enough to go to school?

MA: Did what?

B: Did you continue working after your youngest child was born?

MA: I quit.

B: And then they fired you from the theater.

MA: Yeah I got fired.

B: Okay. Lets see uh

MA: Now I...I taught school 'til I was sixty-three.

B: You did.

MA: I started out in...lets see what did...the year Robert graduate. Uh...he was born in nineteen, forty-five. And how long does it take you to get to high school?

B: Seventeen, or eighteen...

MA: Ten years...

B: When he graduated he would have been seventeen, or eighteen.

MA: Well I started when he was in high school.

B: Oh okay...

MA: So uh...then uh...at sixty-three I had a cancer operation and I had to quit, but I wished I'd kept on because I was well after...I never did have no trouble with it.

B: What kind of cancer did you have?

MA: Huh?

B: What kind of cancer did you have?

MA: Uh...the hysterectomy whatever women call it.

B: Okay. How did they find out that...that you had a cancer?

MA: I go to the Greenbrier clinic every year.

B: Okay. When you were younger did women go (clears throat) excuse me, for uh...gynecological examinations frequently as they do now? Okay.

MA: No...

B: Okay...

MA: No, I was...I had all my children when I started going to the clinic.

B: uh-huh.

MA: It just we really went up there and you have a nice time.

B: uh-huh.

MA: You go to the clinic and then you get a lot of good food to eat and a lot of nice pretty things to see. It's beautiful place. So have you ever been there?

B: No ma'am.

MA: It's gorgeous.

B: Is this up in Greenbrier County?

MA: uh-huh.

B: Okay.

MA: My husband was a golfer and we went with three other people...couples and they played golf and we spent the money.

B: Okay. What kind of uh..social life was there in Matewan? It seems like the theater was the center of the social life in Matewan.

MA: Oh we had a drug store and stay after school and meet in the drug store and talk and see everybody and they had little parties that was down there. We played bridge, our crowd. People of our bridge club. A lot of bridge parties.

B: uh-huh.

MA: And the coal companies gave a lot of parties. We had a lot of those to go to.

B: Where would they have the uh...the parties...the coal companies...where would they have the parties?

MA: In their homes.

B: Okay.

MA: The bosses and everything have big parties.

B: uh-huh.

MA: Wasn't many places in Matewan to have a party. A big party. Sometimes they had them in Williamson at the hotel.

B: uh-huh. Did you uh...did you and your husband uh...know anything about the union activities that went on here in the early twenties?

MA: I don't.

B: Okay.

MA: If anything I use to feel sorry for the people they threw out of the homes I couldn't understand. I was young I couldn't understand why anybody would throw children out of the house. Rainy weather. I didn't know what a union was then.

B: Yeah. Did you ever hear your parents talk about what was going on?

MA: No. They did...they didn't belong or have anything to do with coal so...

B: uh-huh...

MA: Or unions.

B: Okay. How about uh...Mr. Allara did...did he know anything about...

MA: I'm sure that him being a boss he definitely never would have been for the union.

B: Okay.

MA: I...I never hear him say anything though.

B: How did he get along with the men.

MA: Fine.

B: Okay.

MA: He never did have any trouble. I don't know uh...I don't know when unions were even formed. He worked before the had 'em.

B: uh-huh.

MA: probably.

B: Okay. Uh...lets see...

MA: But I've never heard him say against it or for them or anything like that.

B: Do you remember uh...some people say the...the Matewan shoot out and some people say the Matewan Massacre. Do you remember very much about that when it happened?

MA: Well you hear a lot about it...but uh...half of it true some truths and everything you can think about. Just uh...

B: What did you consider was the truth about...about the massacre? Do you have an opinion?

MA: No I don't...I don't'...I wouldn't have any because I wouldn't repeat what lots...what most people say to anybody. Use to say. But I wasn't telling people.

B: Why is that?

MA: Well you live in a town you know you just don't like to uh... implicate people that...they talk about.

B: Okay. uh...did you ever meet Sid Hatfield or Ed Chambers?

MA: Yes. I knew Sid well. He was a good looking man. Handsome man. And was married to a beautiful woman.

B: Did you know Jessie?

MA: No not Sid...the Chambers boy was married to the pretty girl.

B: Okay.

MA: Now Sid married C.C. Testerman's widow.

B: uh-huh. Did you know Sally, Ed's wife?

MA: Yeah.

B: Sally Starr.

MA: I know all of her people.

B: Okay. Did you know her personally?

MA: Her what?

B: Did you know her personally?

MA: Yes.

B: Okay.

MA: Well I didn't associate with her but I know her.

B: Okay.

MA: She is older than I am.

B: uh-huh.

MA: If that's possible.

B: Yes. uh...lets see in one of my interviews it was mentioned that...that Sally when she remarried, she married the lawyer...

MA: She married the lawyer that defended uh...Sid and what 'cha call him. Sid and...

B: and...and the other defendants?

MA: Yeah.

B: Okay. I...in the course of that interview uhit...it was said that the lawyer was a communist. Did you ever hear anything like that?

MA: No.

B: You didn't. Okay.

MA: He was in Charleston and they left here in uh...after that we didn't know.

B: Okay.

MA: Now that I never heard that said but it could have been I guess.

B: uh-huh. Okay. uh...was there anything that you care to say that was said about Sid or Ed that you can recall?

MA: Well as far as I know everybody in our area was crazy about Sid Hatfield. And that Chambers boy too.

B: Uh...when you say crazy about they were really well liked?

MA: Yeah.

B: Okay.

MA: By everybody.

B: uh-huh. Was there any reason or were they just...

MA: No.

MA: Almost any where you go down here was a Chambers at that time.

B: uh-huh. Okay.

MA: I guess really people were a little afraid of them, McCoys and Hatfields. I know when I went away to school kids up there were scared to death of me.

B: Because of the reputation?

MA: Because of the...yeah...if I followed the...the massacre and the Hatfield and McCoy feud. I'd get anything done around school.

B: What did they say to you?

MA: They didn't say anything! If I said I wanted something or something somebody would run and get it just like I...they found out I wasn't as bad as them.

B: Okay. What relatives of yours were uh...people from the feud. Were there relatives of yours that were involved in the feud?

MA: No.

B: No. Okay.

MA: The Hatfields were. But not the McCoys.

B: Okay. How about uh...back in the eighteen hundreds during the feud, were there McCoys from...from your side of the family that were involved in the feud?

MA: Hum-um.

B: No...okay.

MA: They lived at...during when the feud was going on they lived at Blackberry City right up here. They owned all that ground and had their home up there. But uh...they not any of them ever were in the feud.

B: Okay. Do you remember when your father was born?

MA: He was born this...he was about two years old or three when the feudin'...when the feud....

B: Did he ever tell you about...

MA: He wouldn't have known anything about it.

B: Okay.

MA: Well uh...he had a sister that was a lot older. She told us a lot of things about the feud. We don't remember any of it.

B: Okay.

MA: She use to tell us about hiding out in the fields at night and afraid they'd burn the home, and then they didn't. And uh... trips that Devil Anse Hatfield would make la...around through this area and stop at people's homes and...and sometimes you know that...one night he was supposed to go through and he stopped at the house and ask if he could uh...that it was getting dark and they were going to Logan County could uh...they keep them for the night and uh...the man had a lock on his gate and he uh...unlocked and he said we got to lock it up you know because he said they tell us Devil Anse Hatfield is through this area and we'll lock the...we keep everything locked up. So he decided then he's not gonna tell his last name. So he goes in and they give him supper take him up stairs and he sleeps in the attic room him and his son and uh...next morning he goes out and uh...the man goes to the gate with him their thanking him for the night and shakin' hands and what a good time he had and everything. He said by the way I'm Devil Anse Hatfield and this is my son.

B: Oh my goodness.

MA: He couldn't believe anybody could be so nice.

B: uh-huh. So was...was that a uha relative of yours that Devil Anse had actually...

MA: No.

B: ...stayed with. Okay.

MA: He probably was in a way cause I...I'm related to about every Hatfield in the community around here.

B: How...how's that?

MA: Well between my mother and my uh...father and my uh...great grandmother was a Hatfield so you get mixed up.

B: Now in another interview of mine uh...it was mentioned that a Mrs. Buskirk and her daughter ran a hotel. Do you know? Was there a Mrs. Buskirk that ran a hotel?

MA: Uh...she was my uncles' sister-in-law.

B: Okay. And was that the Urias hotel that she...

MA: Yes.

B: Okay. How long was the Urias hotel in business?

MA: Well they...why I...I guess and uh...lets see the new one was built in seventeen, or eleven what was it?

B: I think it was...

MA: The brick...

B: The Buskirk building is nineteen, eleven.

MA: Really...well the had a wooden hotel first and it burned then they built the other one.

B: The wooden hotel burned?

MA: I'm not sure when it burned but I know it burned. Wood.... the wooden burned and they built the new one.

B: uh-huh. Okay. Uh...Mr. Allara appears so prominently whenever someone talks about Matewan was he uh...involved in any of the... the other civic organizations in town was he ever mayor of Matewan or anything like that?

MA: No he was never mayor but he was...he worked in every civic organization in this county.

B: And can you tell me about some of those?

MA: Well he worked Salvation Army, uh...Rotarians and...(tape cuts off - family came in)...about a lot of Buskirks.

B: That's...we were...we were just talking about the uh...Mrs. Buskirk that ran the Urias hotel. What about the other Buskirks that just got mentioned? Who are the other Buskirks?

MA: Well the that uh...was my uncle and Aunt Meldy and then Aunt Meldy died and he went to uh...oh shoot where they have a hot springs...uh...springs. Anyway that's where he married and met her and she had two children, girls.

B: This is...

MA: Ruby Lee and he married her and uh...they ran the hotel until their son was born and he died...the day his son was born.

B: Mr. Buskirk died the day...

MA: Yes.

B: ...his son was born?

MA: And then from there on she took over the hotel and ran it.

B: What did he die of?

MA: He was operated on for a Carbuncle on the back of his neck.

B: uh-huh. I guess the...the best way to get started up again is just to go through some chronological events. Do you remember World War I? Anything about World War I?

MA: Uh...well I remember the troop trains a going through and waving to 'em and.

B: uh-huh.

MA: that's about all I remember it.

B: How about the uh...the great flu epidemic?

MA: I don't remember anything about it because I was unconscious for seven weeks.

B: Seven weeks!

MA: My sister died during that...my oldest sister. Now I'm the oldest.

B: Okay. So you were unconscious seven weeks with the flu?

MA: They really didn't think that any of us would live but all of us lived except one.

B: uh-huh. Okay. How were you all treated? Were there medical treatments that you were given? Did you know about?

MA: (Mrs Allara was nodding no) My daddy order oranges uh.... from Huntington and something else...you couldn't get anything here back in those days. You had to order it.

B: uh-huh.

MA: Like fresh fruits and things. People uh...my mother she didn't get sick.

B: She didn't get sick?

MA: Somebody had to take care of us. So uh...she and Lucille Chancey.

B: uh-huh.

MA: A girl that died with Tuberculosis.

B: uh-huh.

MA: Took care of us...changed our clothes and washed the clothes. And she never got sick. A lot...she waited on a lot of people and everybody had the flu...somebody in the family...

B: uh-huh. Did any one from Matewan die or from Blackberry City?

MA: Oh yeah. There was about one out of every home here died just about.

B: uh-huh.

MA: Uh...the McKinsey girl died she lived right across the bridge from us.

B: uh-huh.

MA: Somebody I guess in about every home had a death.

B: Okay. How about the uh...the great depression? What do you remember about the great depression?

MA: It was marvelous, could spend a dollar a day on groceries and had was all I wanted to eat. Never was hungry, could even help feed people.

B: uh-huh.

MA: It wasn't bad. Might have been bad for some people but as long as you got a dollar a day you could live.

B: uh-huh. And...and how did you get this dollar a day?

MA: Well I taught school to begin with.

B: It didn't put the teachers out of work?

MA: Fifty dollars a month or so only thing I got, fifty or sixty.

B: uh-huh. Okay. Uh...

MA: You could pay your rent and eat.

B: uh-huh. How about the uh...the different programs? Do you remember did the WPA come to Matewan did the CCC work camps did people...

MA: I don't remember any work that they did around here but they did have them. But I...I don't know anything that you don't... the only thing that I know that WPA built is still standing is that rock wall at Welch, West Virginia.

B: uh-huh.

MA: Around here that's the only thing that I remember. It stood out and still worth it.

B: Now we get to World War II. You said Mr. Allara taught people how to fly?

MA: uh-huh.

B: Was this in the military or...

MA: I don't know. He...he trained at an army base in uh...Alabama. What's that...what's that army base runner...

B: Okay. How did Mr. Allara learn to fly?

MA: The manager of the theatre knew how to fly so he uh...Frank bought a...after he taught him on his plane why he bought his uh...second hand plane. And he and his mother worked on that plane and fixed it up and took up silk stuff that covered the wings...two wing plane...I guess what do ya call it? Two wing and they covered that plane and he flew it.

B: And then he went and...and worked for the army and trained people to fly in Alabama?

MA: Well uh...he had a piper cub after that and learned to fly on better he wrecked it two times. On Bluefield Mountain. But uh...he never did get hurt none.

B: I believe this is Mr. Allara I heard something about a man being dared to fly between a bridge was it a bridge? And do...do you remember that dare?

MA: I guess he flew under that bridge up here uh...McCarr.

B: At McCarr.

MA: That was a small plane.

B: How big was the bridge?

MA: Ah...it was pretty good size of...

B: Do...do you know who dared him to...to fly that?

MA: No.

B: Okay.

MA: He wouldn't take a dare I'm sure.

B: Oh really?

MA: I don't think he would.

B: So why did he...why did he fly under that bridge?

MA: I don't know he's just smart aleck I guess.

B: Okay.

MA: I don't know.....what would cause him to, have no idea.

B: Okay. uh...another one of the...the big topics in...in Matewan is the floods. Uh...what do you remember say about the 1977? What stands out in your mind about that?

MA: That's the one I don't want to remember. That's why I'm up in the air.

B: Oh okay.

MA: Uh...we had five foot of water...five and a half foot of water in this house.

B: uh-huh. Okay. So this house was...was raised?

MA: Yeah...

B: Off the ground because of the flood?

MA: Because of the flood.

B: Okay.

MA: But I've been so...through so many floods. When we lived down in Matewan you could count on a flood a year. First...that little house that...where we moved into a big brick house they're all gone now and nothing down there. But it was up to the top floor several times. You just ruin your furniture year by year.

B: uh-huh. But people didn't leave they...

MA: No. They go in and scrub them out and go back in them and fix them up. And that was usually...that uh...big brick house that's came apart downtown. Many floods everything. But I didn't live in it I was married then...I lived in it a little while. Then after I got married I...I've helped scrub them out but uh...I didn't live in it. And I said I'd never build a house in the that was in the flood

B: uh-huh.

MA: But this place up in this end of the town has never been in a flood...just once '77.

B: Okay. How about the uh...the 1984 flood I believe it was? Did that reach as far as the 1977?

MA: Did what?

B: Did the 1984 flood reach as far as the 1977 flood? (Mrs. Allara nodding no) Okay.

MA: I don't know how big it was. But I know of uh...I saw the first part...no it wasn't nothin' compared to the seventy-seven flood is the biggest we ever had.

B: uh-huh. uh...lets see how about the town in...in the fifties? What kind of economy did Matewan have in the fifties? Was it a busy town?

MA: Man the fifties uh...that was kind of booming wasn't it? In the fifties I guess you would call it booming everything and everybody...everybody's work and uh...theaters were doing fine.

B: Okay so was there uh...what kind of businesses were downtown in...in the fifties? Do you remember?

MA: Coming after the fifties?

B: uh-huh.

MA: Well they got more eating places and uh...bank got bigger. I don't...there was a lot of improvements, roads and everything.

B: When was your husband active in the...in the National Bank there?

MA: You know when he started in the bank? Tape cuts off

B: So Mr. Allara was in...in the bank in the late fifties?

MA: I would say.

B: Okay. Do you remember the names of any of the stores or...or the restaurants downtown?

MA: I don't remember any of them right now.

B: uh-huh. How about some...some more general questions. I'm interested in...in social customs. What did a couple do when they were dating say when you before you and Mr. Allara married? What did you do when you were courting?

MA: Well you sat on the front porch and your daddy sitting in the living room and whenever it came ten o'clock he said go home.

B: At ten o'clock?

MA: Yes. And when could you leave the front porch? When were... did you go on dates?

MA: You had to get an awful good excuse to go somewhere. Had to be a good one.

B: Say a birthday party or...

MA: Yeah but you had to name everybody that was going and everything else.

B: And how old did a girl have to be before she could date? Say in your family in particular.

MA: I'm not sure the ages of how old but uh...I never went to town until about twelve so I wouldn't have known. And I wouldn't dare look at a boy at that time.

B: uh-huh. Was there a reason why you were already twelve before you went to town?

MA: Yeah my mother wouldn't let me.

B: Why was that?

MA: I don't know she...(Tape cuts off because Mrs. Allara receives a phone call)

B: You say people were...were different back then about how they treated their children...

MA: Well the boys could do anything they wanted to but not girls.

B: What kind of things did they boys do?

MA: Well they could go any where they wanted to. Uh...if uh...the table was full and a boy came in and a girl had a seat the girl got up and he got to eat in her place. Different world then.

B: Why was that was that, do you know?

MA: They just looked up to the uh...boys.

B: uh-huh.

MA: I guess like the Chinese do.

B: Okay.

MA: Girls ain't no count you could ground them, they all did. All of them uh...parents back in those days boys get by with anything not a girl.

B: Yeah. Okay. Uh...was a girl supposed to be a certain age before she could get married or did girls marry when they married?

MA: Well now they would like for everybody to get married when they were twenty-one at least.

B: uh-huh.

MA: But they didn't have that uh...early marriages.

B: uh-huh. Okay.

MA: They tried to get you out of high school at least.

B: uh-huh. Okay. Were girls aware excuse me...allowed to wear make-up back then?

MA: Not many of us did. Very few used make-up.

B: uh-huh. What did they people think of the girls that did wear make-up?

MA: A hussy. Mostly our people thought.

B: How about uh...I know in the twenties it became popular for girls to cut their hair short was anything said about that in Matewan?

MA: If I remember I cut mine short then. The first time I've... uh...terrible. It was terrible. There was not beauty shops you had to go a barber shop to get cut. Most men wouldn't even cut it.

B: Why was that?

MA: They didn't want a woman in their barber shop. There was only one barber shop in Matewan that cut womans hair then.

B: Who...who was that?

MA: Landon Keesee.

B: What did your parents say when you cut your hair?

MA: Well they like to had a fit but I was away at school and I came home wasn't nothing they could do about it. It's already cut. I would have never gotten permission to cut it I'm sure.

B: uh-huh. Were there other uh...young women in town with their hair cut short or were you the...the first one?

MA: Uh...no but I think a lot of them cut theirs after that.

B: Okay.

MA: Very few, almost everybody had long hair.

B: Did you come from a religious family?

MA: What now?

B: Did you come from a religious family? What...what religion were you raised in?

MA: Methodist.

B: Methodist.

MA: Yeah we went to church and Sunday school. Even when we lived up Sulphur Creek my father brought us to Sunday school to Matewan. We walked...

B: uh-huh...

MA: ...to Matewan to Sunday school. He put us in Sunday school and he went to the bar and worked and when Sunday school was over we met him at the bar and we walked back home.

B: uh-huh. Did your mother go to church when you...

MA: No she always had a baby.

B: Okay.

MA: But somebody had to stay home.

B: Okay. Lets see.

MA: But my father always took us.

B: uh-huh. Do you remember the name of any...the ministers that were at your church?

MA: Uh...Reverend Williams was the uh...head of the church uh... the preacher and he was in charge of...I don't remember too much about him cause I was...we were small then.

B: When you ran the theater uh...did the blacks and whites sit in separate sections? They all sat in...together?

MA: The whites sat downstairs the blacks had the balcony. But the whites would go up and sit with the blacks. The blacks wouldn't come down and sit with the whites.

B: uh-huh. Okay.

MA: That wasn't fair either.

B: Uh...did the uh...did the law integrate before the theater closed? I mean did the...did the law ever change while you owned the theater? Okay.

MA: Not before it closed it didn't.

B: Well when did it close?

MA: I don't really remember. Uh...I would say sometime in the sixties.

B: uh-huh.

MA: I would say. I guess I could hunt it up some where but.

B: You say uh...your husband was a superintendent for a while for a coal company do you remember which coal company?

MA: Uh..he was superintendent of Yates Coal Company and uh...he was superintendent over at McCarr, Kentucky over here but I don't remember the name of the coal company. I'm not sure I think he was a superintendent of one in Logan County but I can't remember...the Stirrat I believe it was.

B: Stirrat?

MA: Stirrat, West Virginia.

B: How did he feel about working for the coal companies in such a pro-union area? I mean how did people...how did...how did you get along in the community?

MA: We got along with everybody. He did too. I'm sure...I'm sure they didn't have any unions at that time that he worked. Positive. Cause we would have bound to have trouble.

B: uh-huh.

MA: At some time. Now he was too well respected by everybody that he worked for, Too have ever any trouble with them.

B: Alright. Is there anything else that you would like to talk about today or that you can think of that...that you'd like to say about Matewan?

MA: Well the only thing about Matewan...Matewan once upon a time was a beautiful a little town. Everybody was good workers they kept the yards clean they kept everything clean and had a lot of flowers and had a lot of pretty things. Uh...it was beautiful. And then when I saw Matewan on TV and I saw that little dirty town I thought that was terrible. Now Matewan never looked like that. Matewan had a nice uh...train station and well kept back part of it uh...it didn't look like...

B: The one that was in the movie?

MA: Yeah.

B: Okay.

MA: Did you see Matewan?

B: Yeah. Yes I did.

MA: Did you like the looks of that little town?

B: Well...

MA: Oh now we never looked like that. We were a beautiful little town.

B: Did...so it...it was...it was a clean looking little town it wasn't...

MA: Yes once upon a time.

B: People kept things cleaner?

MA: Of course actually if you had as many floods as we've had you'd probably look like we do. And of course the '77 flood what's ruined Matewan. It took everything out. Took all the houses on the back row of town now. Ruined all the restaurants washed off, caved in everything like that...just ruined it.

B: uh-huh.

MA: But we'll build it back. It'll be back again some day.

B: That's what were hoping. Okay. Uh...so you saw the movie Matewan and you didn't like it?

MA: Yeah I loved the picture but I didn't like...well that town being called Matewan.

B: Okay.

MA: Mount Hope...was that where it was?

B: I think it was Thurmond.

MA: Thurmond. It's nothing compared to Matewan. At no time... I'm... listen Matewan's better shape now than Thurmond was then. But Matewan's a lovely place to live.

B: uh-huh. Have you ever heard of Mingo County being called Bloody Mingo?

MA: Yeah.

B: Do you know why?

MA: On account of the Hatfields and McCoys and the Massacre. That's what they call me Bloody Mingo when I went to school.

B: That's what they called you?

MA: That what my name was. That was my name.

B: uh-huh. How did you feel about getting called that?

MA: It didn't bother me. I didn't mind.

B: Okay.

MA: I knew they didn't mean it.

B: uh-huh. uh...did you vote when you know when you were younger? What did you think about women being able to vote?

MA: I don't know I just...I never thought about it.

B: uh-huh. Did you vote?

MA: I vote every year.

B: Okay.

MA: I can't fuss if I don't vote.

B: Are you a...a democrat or a republican?

MA: I'm a republican.

B: Okay. What does it mean for you to be a republican?

MA: Not much in Mingo County. Not much...ah but politics don't bother me.

B: How about your husband was...was he a democrat or a republican?

MA: Republican.

B: Did you two...

MA: My babe, I've always been a republican.

B: uh-huh. So your father was a....

MA: What difference does it make you know...

Matewan Oral History Project Collection