People of Mount Prospect

Does MPHS have photographs: Yes

Date of Interview: September 25, 1991

Interviewer: Jim Jirak

Oral History Text:

JIM JIRAK: I’m working on behalf of the oral history project for the seventy-fifth anniversary of the village of Mount Prospect. This evening I’m talking to Norbert C. Huecker at his home at 518 Noyes Street in Arlington Heights. Today is September 25-this is a Wednesday-1991. The time is about 7:00 in the evening. Norb, I want to thank you for agreeing to be interviewed and for signing the release forms. We appreciate your help in this project. Let me start out by asking you something simple, we hope-what is your full name?

NORBERT HUECKER: Norbert Heucker-H-U-E-C-K-E-R.

JIRAK: When were you born, and where?

HUECKER: 110 Northwest Highway; July 10, 1922. That’s right next to where the fire station and the police station was.

JIRAK: In Mount Prospect.

HUECKER: Yes.

JIRAK: And your parents were whom?

HUECKER: My dad’s name was Richard Huecker, and Amanda Huecker.

JIRAK: When did you move to Mount Prospect?

HUECKER: I was born there.

JIRAK: And so you have lived there all your life.

HUECKER: Yes.

JIRAK: What is your address now?

HUECKER: 518 East Noyes, Arlington Heights.

JIRAK: Have you ever lived at any other address in the village?

HUECKER: Ch, yes. In 1932 or something like that-or ’34-we moved over on 1 West Central Road in a home that my dad owned over there. That’s where the gas station is now. There was a home there before we torn that down and made a gas station there. When he moved there he had the garage next door, and we sold Plymouth and-first he sold Fords in 1932 there, and then he picked up a Ford in Detroit that time and it took nine quarts of oil to get back to Chicago. He said, “I’m not selling that car,” so then he sold Plymouth and DeSoto. But prior to that-this goes back to 110 North Northwest Highway-that’s where I was born-in the back there my dad had repair shops-a couple of repair bays back there; a pit to work on cars, too-and had the gas pump right out on Northwest Highway there where he sold gas. And then in the front of this building that they just tore down about three or four weeks go, he had one window in there and he would open up that window and he would put a car in there-because he was selling open Pontiacs and stuff like that there-and he would put a car in there, and on the other side of the store he sold some of these radios. These were the first radios that came into Mount Prospect. They ran on a storage battery like they’ve got in a car, and that’s the only battery they really had. You know, you have to charge these batteries up. But he sold those, and then he fixed shoes and all that stuff in the same building there. Then it was in 1932 or something that he had moved over on Central Road and Main Street-there’s a home there-and he bought the garage and that stuff in the back. That’s when he went into Ford for ’32 and then he stopped on account of the oil burning and then went into Plymouth and DeSoto for two years, and then he sold Fords again until 1937. Then in 1937 we dug all the dirt out by that corner there where the house is at and started making a gas station out of that. But prior to that, you figure from that building on-where I was born-you had Busse’s Grocery Store and you had Burda’s.

JIRAK: Where were they located?

HUECKER: They were right on the corner of Northwest Highway and Emerson. Burda’s had the drugstore there. And then there were doctors-Dr. Jensen had offices in that same building upstairs, and Dr. [William] Granzig. And if you go down the street a little north, there was nothing but homes, like the Busses-there was Castrina Busse, Edwin Busse and all of them just had homes all along there. That was really the only business that was there. I can remember right there at 110 Northwest Highway-that building that they just tore down-that was a cornfield. Right after the cornfield they had a baseball diamond there. I remember all the guys in town used to play baseball there. Anyway, they made a baseball diamond. We lived in the lower apartment there, and I remember they would be breaking windows all the time. They were playing with a sixteen-inch ball. But they fixed all the windows. Nothing’s been said here around town; well, I remember the creamery over there where Schimming used to be, but I don’t remember anything about it. And then, like I say, there was Crofoot Co. that had factory over there, right next to where the old village hall was.

JIRAK: Do you remember what they made?

HUECKER: Well, Crofoot made staples-staples for stapling paper together. And then there was a cash register place in there, too. They made old cash registers-well, they weren’t old then; they were new cash registers-but they made those there. The man was Crofoot, and I think he made the Crofoot staples. But as you go down Busse, the florist over there was my uncle. When he got married my grandfather gave him a lot and a house right over there as a wedding present, and then he started the greenhouse over there. As you come along past the stores and you get down to the corner, [John C.] Moehling had that building on the corner over there. I think there is a chiropractor in there now.

JIRAK: Corner of …?

HUECKER: Of Main and Northwest Highway. There was a tavern in there, and I remember as a kid going in there with my dad. And then there were stores there-Meeske’s and some of those. They had a dry goods store. I remember the one fellow had a dry goods store-a nice man-and he would go downtown if people needed a spool of thread or something like that- the next day he would go downtown and pick up these ladies spools of thread. I can remember being in a gas station, pretty near a block away; he had a laugh like you wouldn’t believe. You could hear it a block away. But anyway, I don’t know how long he stayed there. Then right across the street, the First Bank building was on the corner of Busse and Main Street, and I remember when the bank moved out of there and they moved into the other quarters that was a little restaurant. I remember eating in that restaurant. Other than that, there was nothing but farms all around. Central Road and Northwest Highway and Rand Road and Foundry Road-nothing but farms just allover. I can remember, too, the farmers used to come into town with sugar beets. Sugar beets was a big thing in those days, and they would bring the sugar beets over by the railroad tracks. They had a method of lifting the trucks up and pouring the sugar beets in there, and then they would haul them away. But I can remember as a kid, playing on Northwest Highway, the first cement they had on it. They were adding lanes, but I can remember playing on Northwest Highway, sitting on the bales of straw. There are so many things [we did] as kids that I remember-I’m 69 years old-that kids [today] will never see, like seeing an ice man come, carry ice on his back and carry it up and put it in the icebox [after] they called you. I remember the milk~man, too, and how they would come down the street, and how in the wintertime that little cream would push out of the bottle and we’d try to get it. But so many things that kids would never realize or just can’t imagine. Just the same as I remember my dad when he sold cars, people would trade in bicycles, pianos, gold and everything else. When they bought a car they would trade all this stuff in. I can remember the gypsies that would come into town would buy old gold and that stuff, too. My dad would get a watch in trade on a car and I thought that one time that I could fix it. I tore it all apart. Well, I never got it together, but when the gypsies came to town I think I sold it, and maybe I got a dollar and a half for it. Like I say, Kruse’s on the other side of the railroad tracks-they were there. He was a beer distributor, plus he had the tavern and a restaurant there. People really liked it. In those days you would go in a tavern-well, I don’t visit them anyway-but they would have cheese and crackers there to eat and nibble on. But they put out wonderful meals. Prior to that, Herman Meyn was on the corner of Busse and Northwest Highway where the Carriage House is now. That’s where he started with his blacksmith shop. Then he moved over there on Emerson Street in back of P & Me, and that’s where he had his tractor place. I can remember horses in there, and I can remember shoeing the horses and how the horses would go to the bathroom. What a messy job-the horses going to the bathroom, and all that stuff, too. But he shoed horses in there, too. He was a hard-working guy. I remember on Pine Street the pickle factory they had there. I think it was Budlong pickle factory [Schillo Brothers Pickel Factory], and I remember the vats they had there. We got a kick as kids-and I know we’d throw things in the vats. And the birds, they’d be in there-Lord knows what they were putting in there-but I can remember we’d take pickles out of there and eat some of the pickles. They were good, but the sanitation wasn’t too good. They had onion houses there, too, where he would have onions all the time. Come Halloween, the biggest thing somebody would do on Halloween would be to tip over somebody’s outhouse. That was a big thing. Even like on the corner where I’m at-Central and Main, where I have my gas station now-across the street from that there was greenhouse there by the name of Homeyer-I think his name was Homeyer; Charlie Homeyer. He had that greenhouse there, and then later on in years a guy by the name of Bill McReynolds-they called it Hook’s Nursery-he was there. But I can remember as a kid, working across the street over there for 35 cents an hour, and there was no such thing as sticking your head up and looking around. You worked for that 35 cents an hour. Even for Heine Kruse-I worked for Heine Kruse; he was an uncle of mine-I worked on the beer truck from 5:00 in the morning until 7:00 at night for two dollars a day, and he said, “Don’t get hurt. I haven’t got any insurance on you.” But it was fun years. All along Central Road, it really was nothing but farms.

JIRAK: Norb, let me ask just for the record, can you tell us within an outline what considered the downtown area-what were the boundaries.

HUECKER: Well, the Busses on Emerson and Northwest Highway. That was about it. Later on in years it ran over where Main Street is over there-that was really about the biggest extent of it. Nobody realizes it, but that Elmhurst Road, as you see, it is an S-curve. But we had a commissioner in town, there, that was related-William Busse, the commissioner. I think he was mayor at the same time. His son had that garage there. It was Albert. When they made that road, Commissioner Busse said, “You’re going to bend that road, and you’re going to put that in front of my son’s garage,” and they did it. They bent it and put it in front of his son’s garage. In those days, they could have run it right straight through. There’s nothing there. But he said, “I want that road to go in front of my son’s garage,” and they put it in front of his son’s garage. But to me, it raised the value of my property, too, so I can’t complain. I can’t remember-on the other side of the railroad tracks-when those stores really started over there. That was later on. But the way I see and from what I hear, it’s just a shame that I don’t have my dad or I don’t have somebody really to inquire of why my dad even had the garage there. That was over there on Central Road. He sold gas, and that’s where he sold Fords until 1937. This was in ’34, and there was a lot of bootlegging. I can remember cars in there that they had confiscated or picked up. They had guns in them or liquor, and the police department was holding them. People don’t realize-I was driving through Arlington Heights the other day and I was telling a fellow right along Northwest Highway here in Arlington Heights-I think it was a gravel road or a two-lane road-I can remember they had a cigar store, Gander Cigars. Do you remember that?

JIRAK: Yes.

HUECKER: I can remember it was named after the guy’s geese, and the geese would be walking around there by the road. We went to church in Arlington Heights then, and I can remember my one uncle Mr. Deering, why, we’d be driving along, and he chewed tobacco. He spit out the front window and it would come in the back. We kids would dive on the floor. But between the sugar beets and things like that, there were peonies. Peonies were a big thing. Everybody was growing peonies. On Miller Road there were nothing but peonies. I remember my uncle across the street, Mr. Deering, had a lot there-a 50- or lOa-foot lot-they grew nothing but peonies. Between the peonies and the sugar beets, I think that was one of their biggest things. And as far as the automobiles, the only dealers at that time, really, was Busse and my dad.

JIRAK: Which Busse was that?

HUECKER: That was Albert.

JIRAK: Son of the commissioner, right?

HUECKER: His dad and his brother was the commissioner. But there was another fellow, Gilbert Busse, who was a wonderful man; the hardest working guy. You ought to see him working. He’d be there seven days a week working in that garage there for his brother Albert. Gilbert, he’s the grandfather to Wayne Busse. I can remember horses and buggies coming into town. On the corner of Central and Main, there, you’d see them. I can remember the one time, even Dr. Jensen had his horse, and he took the horse in co-Hopper’s Bowling Alley, and [in time] they got it thrown out. But he had the horse in the bowling alley. He was my dentist, but he was a nice guy.

JIRAK: Let me ask you, just to cover some of these point, where did your family shop for groceries?

HUECKER: Mainly right in town there.

JIRAK: Okay, with whom?

HUECKER: Busse’s store, and over at Meeske’s-you know, Meeskes had that place there. That would be the main ones.

JIRAK: Where were they located?

HUECKER: Busse’s was right on the highway-lOB Northwest Highway, or something like that; right next to where I was born.

JIRAK: And Meeske’s?

HUECKER: Meeske’s, they were on the corner of Busse by Elmhurst Road-right on the corner there.

JIRAK: That would be across from your station now.

HUECKER: Down on the next corner, right where the bakery is.

JIRAK: The Continental.

HUECKER: The Continental, yes-right there. That was Meeske’s building. The father had it, and then the sons. They ran it, but I don’t think they liked the business, or something.

JIRAK: Okay. How about clothes and shoes?

HUECKER: Well, this fellow right next to where the bakery is now, they had a dry goods place there, and they would sell stuff there, but I think the big thing in those days was Sears & Roebuck, you know-the catalog-because the catalogs were big and people would just order stuff from catalogs.

JIRAK: Was it pretty popular to go to Des Plaines, as far as you can recall?

HUECKER: Oh, I’d say yes. Later on people would go to Des Plaines, because I can remember going to Des Plaines and you would-how many years ago was that? Forty-five years ago. They would have a five and dime there, too. My wife really came from Des Plaines, but I can remember you would drive around the block maybe four, five, six times before you could find a parking place up in Des Plaines to go into these stores up in Des Plaines there. It’s hard to believe, but the story years ago as to why Mount Prospect never really had anything as far as stores, but they said if the Busses didn’t own the land, they just didn’t go into business, and it’s seemed kind of a proven fact. As far as even on the other side of Central Road where the drugstore is now-Duretti’s-that was Hook’s Nursery and prior to that it was Homeyer, but I remember my dad bought a lot on the opposite corner, which was a parking lot. He bought that as a business in 1922, and that was taken out of business in 1934 because they just didn’t want any business down in that thing. They just wanted it as far as Hook’s Nursery was and the drugstore is now.

JIRAK: Where did you shop for hardware?

HUECKER: Wille’s and Busse-Biermann. They were there then. Busse-Biermann-I can remember, too, [you needed] coal in those days; we had coal. I can remember on Central and Main Street, my gas station-now we live there. My mother, she had chickens-raised chickens there, too. On Saturday she maybe baked thirty, forty loaves of bread. I’m telling you, there’s nothing better than that homemade bread with butter and jelly. I remember Dr. Granzig would come over every Saturday morning and we would have bread. But she would make thirty, forty loaves of bread and I think sell them for 20 cents or something like that. But then raise chickens; I remember she had guinea hens there. It was a fun time. I remember no sidewalks. There were no sidewalks by the gas station there. Nothing. Just nothing but fields.

JIRAK: How about your drugstore; medicines and so forth?

HUECKER: Burda-they were there. See, Burda’s, they were on the corner of Northwest Highway and Emerson. I remember they had some kind of contest there I won, too, one time. I won the first balloon-tired bicycle that came into Mount Prospect-the first balloon-tired bicycle-and I had it a long time. You talk of going to school there-across the street from me over there; the gas station there-the public school there, and prior to that they had a little school-a regular church, like-and they used that as a school first. I can remember going eight years to that one over there-that public school over there.

JIRAK: Is that the one in the rear of St. John’s?

HUECKER: No, that’s the one where the library is now. I can remember even as a kid going to grammar school. I hung around with a kid on the south side, down by the creek there. I can remember on rainy days the water was over the handlebars of a bicycle in a real bad storm. I remember in the creek-hunting along the creek; a lot of pheasants, too-but there was a lot of things floating in the creek there that you don’t see floating in there anymore. They’ve got it cleaned up. But even on Emerson Street, there was a farm. The Krohn brothers or something-they ran it. It’s just hard to visualize. The place was nothing but farms, all around Mount Prospect, which I imagine was all over.

JIRAK: How did the stores advertise?

HUECKER: Mainly by the sign in the front of the building, that’s all. They had a sign in the front of the building like “Busse’s Groceries,” or things like that.

JIRAK: How about newspaper advertisements?

HUECKER: Well, I think there was somewhat, but you didn’t see much of it. I don’t remember seeing much of it.

JIRAK: Nothing like today.

HUECKER: No, nothing like today. Because I don’t even know, really, way back when whether they really had anything as far as printing locally. I can’t remember about papers and that stuff.

JIRAK: Do you remember what some of the earliest factories in Mount Prospect were?

HUECKER: Well, the earliest one I can remember is the creamery and Crofoot’s, and then later on you had Illinois Range that started up down there

JIRAK: On Central Road.

HUECKER: And there was Milburn Brothers; they were in the excavator-contractor business.

JIRAK: Well, you had the pickle factory.

HUECKER: They had the pickle factory, yes, and the onion factory over there.

JIRAK: Did they actually can pickles?

HUECKER: No, they didn’t do it. They just had them there, and they were just like-pickling there. They put them in vats and let them lay there, then they were taken some other place and they were canned.

JIRAK: Oh, okay, they didn’t can them there.

HUECKER: No. They had no facilities for canning. I can even remember as a kid, when my dad was over there I used to raise pigeons. In those days, kids would come around and let my pigeons out. I remember digging big holes by the pigeon coops, then laying dirt and cardboard on top. Then they’d fall into it-you know, to keep them away from my pigeons. But there was no such thing as anybody suing one another in those days.

JIRAK: Right. Do you remember any particular interesting stories? You’ve told a little bit about some of the places-particularly the pickle factory-but do you remember anything special about the creamery or the other places?

HUECKER: No, I really can’t remember; just that it was a creamery and then it went into an oil company-Schimming Oil, or something, was in later years. I remember, too, even with the fire department, in those days-this is right where the police station and the fire station is right now-they used to have water fights with the hose and that stuff. The fire department used to fight against other towns. They would have barrels up on a wire and they would have water fights to see who could drive the barrel down to the other end.

JIRAK: There is mention here of the night the power plant burned down. Do you remember anything about that?

HUECKER: I don’t remember that. I don’t know a thing about it. I don’t know what year that was.

JIRAK: Other than the stores and businesses, which buildings were downtown? You’ve got the library, the hospital. ..

HUECKER: the hospital-like Busse’s store and then Busse-Biermann and Wille’s-that was about the extent of the businesses that I can remember, and the dry goods stores and some of the grocery stores.

JIRAK: Did they have a library at that time, in the early ’30s?

HUECKER: I don’t remember a library, no.

JIRAK: How about the hospital?

HUECKER: Hospital, yes. They had that one on the south side of the tracks. Wolfarth-he was the fellow that ran that.

JIRAK: I presume that was for people that had to be temporarily

HUECKER: Either that or I think for people that wanted to have babies or things like that. My daughter was born at home, but she turned out to be a good gal.

JIRAK: Wille Hall-do you remember anything about Wille Hall?

HUECKER: I remember the name, but I just can’t place it. I remember talk of it. It’s like where the water tower is there, too-that was the main business in town; police station, fire station. They had the jail there, you know. They had everything there. At that time a fellow by the name of William Mawsaw, I think he was the chief and he was the deputy and a judge and everything else in town-William Mawsaw.

JIRAK: Where did children hang out, and was there a lovers’ lane worthy of the name?

HUECKER: No, I don’t remember a lovers’ lane. I just remember years ago that I would see cars going down Emerson Street and parking down there because there were dead-end roads that didn’t go anywhere. That’s where a lot of cars would sit. I don’t’ know-they must have been doing some hugging and kissing or something in there.

JIRAK: Okay. Was there anyplace special that businessmen got together to talk?

HUECKER: Not really.

JIRAK: Perhaps the taverns?

HUECKER: I imagine, to sit in the tavern. You see, in those days, too a big thing was like I can remember him and Mr. Kleinswick and my dad, too-most guys, too-a shot and a beer. That was a big thing. Or Wille’s Tavern-that was a big meeting place for businessmen and for guys that hunted and fished and that stuff, too. They would meet in there and talk about fishing and hunting and all that stuff. But they had like a regular hunting club that originated out of Wille’s Tavern.

JIRAK: Do you remember anything about parades downtown, or other special events like picnics or fairs or town events?

HUECKER: I don’t remember too much about parades, but I remember years ago they did have some. A Mr. Schuette, who was a German man in town-he came from Germany and he had a son Frank and they lost him in the service. But I can remember they got some kind of a race together like they have now. That really is big time, you know-a bicycle race-and I remember he was entered in it. I don’t think that lasted-only a year or two and that was the end of that. It kind of fell away.

JIRAK: Were the special Fourth of July or Memorial Day celebrations? Can you recall some of those?

HUECKER: I think just later on. Not the early years-they didn’t have anything. They didn’t have, really, any business to do anything or participate in it.

JIRAK: One of the questions, did the town decorate for holidays? If so, how?

HUECKER: I don’t think in the early years they did, but later on I think they did. But another thing that people don’t know, where the Fanny May candy is now, right on the corner there, they had what they called a sunken garden. It was really pretty. They had a little pond in there with water running all the time, and then they had little benches in there where you could sit. It was really beautiful. What happened to it, I really don’t know. They just took it out of there. But it really was nice. You’d think something like that would be interesting to see, even in this day. You can’t now. All you do it sit over there and eat candy at Fanny May.

JIRAK: How did people come downtown when you first came to Mount Prospect, as you were growing up there?

HUECKER: Well, they had automobiles, but you would see horse and buggies coming to town and tie up there.

JIRAK: The trains then were steam trains, I take it.

HUECKER: Steam trains then, yes. Young guys liked gals, too, and sometimes they’d give a little toot on the old steam when they passed the gals, not that it would get a , you see, but just to scare them a little bit.

JIRAK: Do you remember riding on the train yourself?

HUECKER: Yes, I did a few times. Until this day I don’t think I’ve been on a train fifteen times.

JIRAK: Where did you go? Did you go downtown?

HUECKER: Yes.

JIRAK: We’ve talked about the sugar beets being shipped to and from Mount Prospect. Do you recall at all the milk pails and that sort of thing?

HUECKER: Oh, I remember milk pails standing all around, even on farms. If you went to farms, you would see milk cans sitting around to be picked up. Another thing about the Haberkamps-I don’t know if their name was mentioned yet or not-but you know they had the florist over there on Emerson Street on the other side. They were old-timers in town.

JIRAK: Yes. They were the other florist in town, weren’t they.

HUECKER: Yes.

JIRAK: The Busses and the Haberkamps.

HUECKER: In those days, though, it wasn’t like now. They had greenhouses-where my uncle, he was Fred Busse-but they had greenhouses where they would raise all their flowers and that stuff. Most of them would raise that stuff to sell, but now I think it’s pretty near all shipped in due to airplanes.

JIRAK: We can probably sum it up, Norb, but what would you say is your fondest memory of early downtown Mount Prospect?

HUECKER: Oh, I think just the way it was. You figure with the horses coming into town and, like I say, where I’m at now look across the street and there was nothing but horses and cows. You’d see the cars on Rand Road over there, see. It was just nice, you know, seeing that stuff. It was a nice, little town. It’s a shame that even all these young kids just couldn’t start off in a little, old town like that and then grow up. I remember when the population was about 900 in Mount Prospect. Even with Mr. [George] Whittenberg, the chief, I remember he came into town. He was an unemployed carpenter. At that time my dad was on the Chamber of Commerce, or something they had there like that, you see, and they were having a meeting over there by the water tower in the village hall. My dad said [to George], “Get over there. They’re having a meeting tonight, and they’re looking for a policeman.” And George said, “God, I don’t know how to ride a motorcycle or anything else like that.” But anyway, he went over and he got the job. I remember one time he was chasing somebody, or what, and a dog flew out in front of the motorcycle. He hit that dog, and the only thing that saved him was he slid on his side along the gun, you know-slid on the holster and wore that all through. That’s the only thing that saved him, otherwise it would have skinned him all to pieces.

JIRAK: Maybe this seems like an obvious question, but how has downtown Mount Prospect changed over the years? Do you like the changes, or was it better the way it was?

HUECKER: Well, I don’t think there was ever enough changes, see. Nothing was just done. It isn’t like Des Plaines or Arlington Heights where they had more stores, more things to shop. Mount Prospect was limited to the amount of stores they had, so you’re going to lose people by not having everything so handy. Des Plaines was only three miles away; Arlington Heights three miles away-people could go there and have a better selection of shopping and getting stuff

JIRAK: That should about wind it up, Norb. You’ve talked about if there was anyone thing that you would want the children to remember about the history of their hometown, what would it be? Can you sum that up?

HUECKER: Like I say, you go places now and it’s nothing but a little town with farmers around it. That’s all I can say, you know.

JIRAK: You liked that rural atmosphere.

HUECKER: I think so. If you’ve lived in it and you’ve seen it, you really kind of miss it. Not that I’d go to Wisconsin or places like that-you see these places, and I know I couldn’t stand to live there now, when you’ve seen all the excitement that goes on in Mount Prospect.

JIRAK: Well, that should do it. We thank you very much for consenting to be interviewed. You now will have a place in history.

 

Does MPHS have photographs: No

Date of Interview: June 27, 1988

Interviewer: Helen Becker

Oral History Text:

HELEN BECKER: This is Helen Becker recording for the Mt. Prospect Historical Society on June 27, 1988. I would like to introduce at this time Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence Hodges. Mrs. Hodges is related to some of the early, early settlers in Mt. Prospect, and I’d like to have her tell you –tell us –just who those ancient relatives are. Christine…

CHRISTINE MEYN HODGES: Well, my father was the late John Meyn, a blacksmith –the first blacksmith in the neighborhood. He was a blacksmith and a wagon maker. I remember Mt. Prospect as just a small, little, few streets, and there was probably a dozen children in all of the group. We enjoyed it very much.

BECKER: Where did you grow up?

CHRISTINE HODGES: We grew up –I was born and raised in this house that is still there on the highway.

BECKER: Northwest Highway?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Northwest Highway.

BECKER: Northwest Highway and what cross street?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Busse Avenue and the highway. It’s right at the point.

BECKER: Yes, where that triangle is there. That is where Bob Moore has his lawyers’ office right now, correct?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Right.

BECKER: That was the home and the blacksmith shop?

CHRISTINE HODGES: The blacksmith shop was at the point, and the home was next to it. We had a large house and a big orchard –every kind of fruit tree you want to mention — with a white picket fence around it. I remember that as a beautiful spot.

BECKER: The house is still there, though, you say.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, yes. The house is still there now.

BECKER: How many were in your family?

CHRISTINE HODGES: In all there were eight.

BECKER: What has happened to all of them?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Well, my oldest sister, she was married and moved to Chicago. The next in line in the family was my brother Herman F. Meyn. He lived in Mt. Prospect.

BECKER: What was he? What did he do?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Well, he was a blacksmith and wagon maker, too, but he was selling farm machinery, it seems like that, and later he was selling refrigerators and deep freezes and things like that with the other things. Then there was my sister Bertha, and she married Arthur Schellenburg from Arlington. He was the son of John Schellenburg, the mason contractor. Then there was Elsie, and she married Edwin Busse. He had a grocery store in town in later years.

BECKER: Oh, a connection with the Busse family.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes.

LAWRENCE HODGES: He was in the creamery at that time when they got married.

CHRISTINE HODGES: He was working at the creamery, the old creamery at the time…

LAWRENCE HODGES: His father always ran the creamery.

CHRISTINE HODGES: And then there was William, and he later started a grocery store. And there was John working for Busse Buick. He worked for Busse Buick. And then myself, and I was married to Lawrence here in 1925.

BECKER: Oh, then you brought him out here.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes, from Elmhurst.

LAWRENCE HODGES: That’s where I lived. When we got married I ran a store in Barrington, and then they opened an A&P here when Busse built that building, and I came down here and worked in here for a little over a year, I guess.

BECKER: How did you meet Lawrence?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, I met him at Snell’s Corners, the dance place.

BECKER: Oh, a dance place.

CHRISTINE HODGES: I went in there with my two girlfriends, and I met him through my girlfriends.

BECKER: Oh, he must have been a good dancer.

LAWRENCE HODGES: She’s still alive.

CHRISTINE HODGES: I remember the town. It was very small then. The few children that were here, we were all friends. In the evening we would all get together out in that empty place –well, it was all empty. There were only two houses here.

BECKER: Two houses.

CHRISTINE HODGES: And we played games and things, you know.

BECKER: Two houses, you mean.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes.

BECKER: What two houses?

LAWRENCE HODGES: Schmaling’s.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Schmaling, and my dad’s house was the first one that ______.

LAWRENCE HODGES: And Luella lived upstairs of the tavern.

BECKER: At Main Street and Busse.

CHRISTINE HODGES: They didn’t have the tavern right off. They had a little building that is now the antique place. That’s where they had a building at that corner.

BECKER: Oh, where Wille Lumber is.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes. Then later they built this tall building. They lived upstairs, and downstairs was Wille Tavern.

BECKER: Is that the present Wille Tavern?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Well, it’s a new building now.

LAWRENCE HODGES: That’s the son.

BECKER: The old tavern was not the present tavern.

CHRISTINE HODGES: No.

LAWRENCE HODGES: That’s still the owner. That’s the son, Adolph. Adolph started that. His father ran the tavern first, didn’t he?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes, he was the first owner, William.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Then Adolph took over the tavern, and then when he built next to that building then his son helped him out in there. Adolph got to be, what, ninety-some years old, and he still goes every day. But he got killed, you know.

BECKER: Yes, I know he did. A couple of years ago, wasn’t it?

CHRISTINE HODGES: ________, I heard.

BECKER: Yes. He walked out in the street without looking, I guess. That was too bad.

CHRISTINE HODGES: But the Wille family lived on the second floor, and the tavern was downstairs. But there were only a few houses down Wille Street. The one at the corner up there at Central and Wille, there was a family living there by the name of Soenksen. And there were a lot of –well, they had about four children there, Erma, Freida, William, Alfred and …I’m trying to remember.

BECKER: I don’t remember the name Soenksen as one of the early families.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, yes, S-O-E-N-K-S-E-N. They lived there, and that grandfather used to be playing that accordion every night and on Sunday afternoon. Mt. Prospect was so quiet and so small that, we lived on the highway and we could hear the music allover town. For us kids that was great, you know. Oh, boy. We’d run over there and we’d enjoy listening to him. And they were a jolly family.

LAWRENCE HODGES: And where did the Holsteys come in? They lived next door.

CHRISTINE HODGES: The Holsteys, they moved in much later years, across the street on Wille.

BECKER: On Wille?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes.

BECKER: In one of those old houses along there on Wille.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Holsteys, Mecklenburg. There was Charlie Mecklenburg who built later.

BECKER: Henningsmeier is another name that I didn’t remember.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Henningsmeier is your grandparents.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, that’s just my grandparents –my mother’s family. Her parents had a farm on Elmhurst Road and, what’s that first street?

LAWRENCE HODGES: I can’t remember the name. It’s right after you get around the curve, the first street there.

BECKER: Council Trail or whatever that is?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, it’s that far down. The very first…

LAWRENCE HODGES: That’s where the farm was.

CHRISTINE HODGES: The very first street there. They had a farm. When they passed on then that was called the Schaeffer farm.

BECKER: You mean where St. Raymond’s parking lot is now?

LAWRENCE HODGES: No,-that’s where St. Raymond’s stops.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Across the street.

LAWRENCE HODGES: That street at the south end of the parking lot.

BECKER: That’s Council Trail.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Council Trail, well, they had it at Council Trail and Elmhurst Road then, and they had their farm. And when the parents passed on, why then the Schaeffer family lived there, which is my aunt and uncle. Fred Schaeffer. They lived there quite a while, and then it all went into Mt. Prospect. Everything was changed. Everything was filled up to now.

LAWRENCE HODGES: And your grandparents had, what, ten daughters? Was it ten?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes. I understand they had ten daughters.

LAWRENCE HODGES: And one son. Oh, no, that was the Schaeffers.

BECKER: I’ll bet he was spoiled.

CHRISTINE HODGES: So my aunt was there, and in the summertime when they’d have threshing, well, I was there every time. That was great fun. You’d hear this machine come through town on Elmhurst Road, and they blew their horn, you know. They blew their whistle, and you knew they were going over to the Schaeffer farm. Of course, all the kids were there, watching this thing, and it was great fun because they’d have a lot of food and the men would all come in to eat, you know, in between. They’d be there about two days. Oh, that was lots of fun.

BECKER: Now, when would that have been –about what year, do you think?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, that would have been probably in 1910.

LAWRENCE HODGES: You were only seven years old then.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes, I was just this little kid. 1910 to 1911 or in there somewhere.

BECKER: Where did you go to school?

CHRISTINE HODGES: I went to public school on Main Street and Central until I was ten years old.

BECKER: Main and Central.

LAWRENCE HODGES: That’s that old building that the Episcopal church bought.

BECKER: Oh, the little white schoolhouse that they moved.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes, they moved it over there, and now the library is at that corner, you know.

BECKER: But it was Central School for a long time.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes. That’s where I went to school till I was ten, and then I went to St. Paul till I was thirteen, almost fourteen. Then they started a little thing, they wanted a high school in town. Well, this old building over there on Busse Avenue which was Bill Wille’s building where, like I said, they were selling feed and all this.

BECKER: Yes, where Wille Lumber and Fuel is.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes, and they had a room there. Well, it was quite a big-sized building with a big room, and they tried to arrange for a high school. They didn’t send us to Arlington. They wanted their own high school, but it didn’t work out. I remember being there, and they had one little old heater in that big room, and it was cold. So the teacher, Teacher Marsh was his name, he would say, “Well, you’d better just all gather around this here little potbellied stove,” they had, as they called it, “and I’ll read for you.” And he’d sit there and read and we didn’t learn very much that season there. So the following year ________.

BECKER: They just tried it for the one year, then.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes. Then the children went to Arlington.

BECKER: I see. The high school was there, in Arlington.

CHRISTINE HODGES: That came later –I think it was about a year later.

LAWRENCE HODGES: And Des Plaines. John and Bill went to Des Plaines.

CHRISTINE HODGES: We were put into Arlington. Yes, if you wanted to finish –the schools weren’t graded. You’d studied all the subjects but you didn’t know what grade you were in, so my parents sent the boys to Des Plaines. They’d take the train and go to Maine High School, the main school there, to get their grading and know what grade were they in and what did they know. But I didn’t go. I don’t know why. They didn’t send me.

BECKER: Well, they didn’t used to send girls too much, I guess.

LAWRENCE HODGES: She had to learn to cook.

CHRISTINE HODGES: They figured a girl had better stay home and learn how to cook and bake, I guess.

BECKER: That’s right.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Well, anyhow, I didn’t get there. But I was more interested in getting going and getting a job. Years ago at fourteen or fifteen you were thinking of working.

BECKER: What kind of job did you go into?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Well, I went to Chicago.

BECKER: You did?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Sure.

BECKER: And you moved ________?

CHRISTINE HODGES: No, I took the train in. First of all, I went down there and there was a lady there that was taking girls and teaching them how to sew. So I went there and I stuck it out one season, and then I went down to the Loop and I got a job and I was working in Chicago.

BECKER: You were.

CHRISTINE HODGES: That’s were I worked. I’d take the train.

BECKER: As a seamstress?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes, well, I worked for Stevens.

BECKER: Oh, you did.

CHRISTINE HODGES: And Hart, Schaffner & Marx –places like that had sewing. I had other opportunities, but I never was interested in changing. I stayed there until I married.

BECKER: Until you got married.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes.

BECKER: Well, then, I gather that you were the early postmaster.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Well, Alvin Beigel was the postmaster at the time, and then the Democrats took over in 1932. The firm I was connected with –I’d worked for the Universal Gypsum for seven years –moved to Buffalo, New York. They wanted me to go along, but I was so attached to this family by that time that I wouldn’t give up. So the postmastership opened up, and then there were the three committeemen from Palatine –George Tatsche and O. S. Johnson, who were the committeemen, endorsed me. Ted Moehling wanted the job, too, at that time, see, but I had the endorsement. And then I was appointed under Roosevelt. I was on a four-year appointment at first. For eight years I was under a four-year appointment, and then they put the postmasters under Civil Service and then they changed that over. Then in 1947 the Republicans took over again, or 1946, and by that time I knew –I used to be very active in politics, the Democratic party here and in Chicago, and I got to know the chief inspector in Washington, D.C., Connor. He used to be inspector for this territory. I wrote him a letter, and I said, “What do you think of the Civil Service?” He wrote back, and he said, “It might be all right, but all it takes is a vote of Congress can change it, and if the assistant’s job opens up, take it because you won’t lose any credits.” So I took over in 1947. I took over the assistant’s job.

BECKER: Where was the post office when you were postmaster?

LAWRENCE HODGES: On Main Street. It was a little store on Main Street.

CHRISTINE HODGES: And from there we moved to…

BECKER: Main Street and what?

LAWRENCE HODGES: Half a block north of Northwest Highway, in that Busse building.

BECKER: That’s right, on the east side of the street.

LAWRENCE HODGES: That’s right.

BECKER: And it was in the same building with…

LAWRENCE HODGES: Oh, there was a barber shop in there, and Otto Landeck’s private store. And there was a bakery in there.

BECKER: National Tea was in there.

CHRISTINE HODGES: And there was a five-and-dime.

LAWRENCE HODGES: The National Tea was in George’s building. That was built later.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, yes, National Tea. That’s right.

BECKER: But then I understand when you started as postmaster there was no home delivery.

LAWRENCE HODGES: No, and I even had to buy all of my equipment in the post office. And I got the Paddocks –they built the Arlington Heights Post Office, and the Paddocks, I knew Bob Paddock very well, the old father, and he had all that old post office equipment up in his attic in his printing place, so he moved all that stuff down here. Beigel wanted six hundred dollars for the equipment, and that was too much. I started in for two thousand dollars a year.

BECKER: Was he eligible to take all that stuff with him, Beigel?

LAWRENCE HODGES: He had to get rid of it. He sold it somewhere. I don’t remember at that time.

BECKER: He would sell it to you for six hundred.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Six hundred dollars, but that was a lot of money in those years.

BECKER: Was it his?

LAWRENCE HODGES: Because it was Bill Busse’s –no, it was Al Beigel’s.

BECKER: It was.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Busse was the postmaster, and then when they opened the bank he put Beigel in there as postmaster.

BECKER: Yes.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Al Beigel, see. Then I bought all that stuff from Paddock for a hundred dollars.

BECKER: A good deal.

LAWRENCE HODGES: And the firm I was with in Chicago was moving to Buffalo, New York, and I got the desk down there, a double desk and chairs and all that stuff, I got a lot of stuff I brought out from the firm I was with.

CHRISTINE HODGES: You had to buy the safe.

LAWRENCE HODGES: And a safe. I had to buy a safe. I bought a safe for ten dollars.

BECKER: Did you have to pay for all that? You did.

LAWRENCE HODGES: I had to pay for that, that’s right. So then when Bill Busse, later on in years, they signed a lease with them, then he bought the equipment from me.

BECKER: Well, tell me, you said you started home delivery.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Yes. At that time I started in there it was a third-class office, I think. It had to be second-class before any delivery service started. And the receipts were not high enough. We only had twelve hundred people, I think, at that time. So I got all the businessman and a lot of friends –I had made a lot of friends in town that worked in Chicago at different businesses –come out here and buy their stamps to bring the receipts up, see. And by the first of July the next year when they changed the ratings, we made the class where we could get delivery service.

BECKER: Then you got one mail carrier?

LAWRENCE HODGES: No, there were two –one on the east side and one on the north side.

BECKER: You said first, though, you had to number all the houses.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Yes. I had to number all of the houses in town. I took the plat and numbered all of the houses and drew a regular plat that I had to send in, you know. And then the carriers, they could walk around the street with just a handful of mail at that time, you know. Especially the afternoon delivery.

BECKER: Oh, that’s right. You had twice-a-day delivery then.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Yes. When I first went in there, stamps were one cent in town. You could mail a letter in town for one cent.

BECKER: In town.

LAWRENCE HODGES: It was two cents out of town.

BECKER: Two cents out of town.

LAWRENCE HODGES: That’s right. So we’ve still got some of those old stamps. She’s got a lot in a stamp collection.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, yes. I saved stamps –something special.

LAWRENCE HODGES: She worked in the post office for twenty-two years.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, yes, I was __________.

BECKER: You were, in town.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes.

LAWRENCE HODGES: She was just part-time in there, then the war came along and then she got in as a __________.

BECKER: Rosie the Riveter?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes, I worked there twenty-two years.

BECKER: That was after you were married, then.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, yes.

BECKER: You helped him out.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, yes.

LAWRENCE HODGES: She had to work longer hours than I did — not longer, but I’d start earlier and then I’d go home and can. I used to can. We’d do a lot of canning –two hundred quarts a year we’d can. Peaches and tomatoes and all that stuff, and I’d go home and can that. She would work until six o’clock.

CHRISTINE HODGES: He’d go to work early, and then I’d come home at six o’clock. I had to get out the last mail, and then I could go home.

BECKER: I think you got the break. I’d rather be working than doing the canning, I think.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Right.

BECKER: So, how many children did you two have?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Three children.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Two boys and a girl.

BECKER: What has happened to them?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Well, they lived in town. Larry lived within three blocks of us, and Betty lived within two blocks.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Larry was in the garage business at that time.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes, a builder. He would build garages. Then suddenly the one of them moved to Wisconsin, the other moved to Florida, and the other decided to try Pennsylvania for a while, and then he moved to Florida, and we were here alone. But we’re still here.

BECKER: That’s good. At least you’ve got places to go to now.

CHRISTINE HODGES: I feel like I belong here.

BECKER: You certainly do.

CHRISTINE HODGES: I feel at home here.

BECKER: Where are you living now?

CHRISTINE HODGES: On 209 Lewis, top floor.

LAWRENCE HODGES: 14 Elm Street.

CHRISTINE HODGES: We lived there first.

LAWRENCE HODGES: We lived upstairs of her father’s over here for a while, too, then we moved on the east side. We rented a place. Then I bought Barclough’s place at 14 Elm Street. It was a house, and I bought that for forty-two hundred dollars.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Can you believe it? A two-story house.

LAWRENCE HODGES: A two-story house.

BECKER: Frame.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Frame, yes. Of course, I did an awful lot of work. We scraped varnish off with razor blades.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes. You know, the old style, well, the floors would be varnished and then there was carpeting in the middle, or a rug. Well, it wasn’t covered completely and we, oh, we worked.

LAWRENCE HODGES: A pipeless furnace.

CHRISTINE HODGES: We worked hard to get it into shape, but when we left there, which was nineteen years we lived there, it was beautiful. But he didn’t want a big, two-story house anymore. He wanted something lower.

BECKER: That’s right. When the kids move out, why, you have to make changes.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes. So we moved into a range.

BECKER: A one-story ranch.

LAWRENCE HODGES: By that time I got enough out of it that I built a brand-new house for what I got for that house, without any mortgage. I didn’t want any mortgage.

CHRISTINE HODGES: No, you don’t want no more mortgage.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Because, believe it or not, in those years it was hard to get a mortgage, for even forty-two hundred.

BECKER: Really?

LAWRENCE HODGES: I had a lot that I traded in. But I was under a four-year appointment yet at that time, and then they changed it to Civil Service and then they put an FHA in, and then I got a loan from the bank.

BECKER: What years were you postmaster?

LAWRENCE HODGES: From 1933 to 1947 –no, in 1947 I changed over to the assistant’s job.

BECKER: Were you in the service at any time, military service?

LAWRENCE HODGES: No. I was over that age at that time. You didn’t have to go either at that time. I was offered a captaincy. They were asking to take postmasters into service at the time, but I wouldn’t leave my family.

BECKER: How big was your family in Elmhurst?

LAWRENCE HODGES: I had three brothers. Four boys.

CHRISTINE HODGES: You were the oldest.

LAWRENCE HODGES: I was the oldest, yes. I was twenty-nine years old when I went into the post office.

BECKER: Well, it worked out very well for you, then.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes, we were very fortunate. Just great.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Well, I said I worked forty-four years without losing a day’s pay. It wasn’t always good pay.

BECKER: Well, that’s true. And now? Now you’ve retired, and how do you spend your time?

LAWRENCE HODGES: I don’t know where the time goes. Well, we head for Florida in the wintertime, and in the summertime I like to fish. We seem to keep quite active.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, yes, we do all our own. ..

BECKER: You said that you had real buddies that you went fishing with.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Oh, yes. I knew all the fishermen in town.

BECKER: Like who?

LAWRENCE HODGES: Les Best and Fred Meeske.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Eddie Haverkamp.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Eddie Haverkamp.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Art Miller.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Art Miller and Al Hockey.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Clarence Winkelman.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Clarence, I never got any –when I got sick then Clarence took my spot. There were always six buddies, and we’d go to Canada every year.

BECKER: Always go to the same place?

LAWRENCE HODGES: Yes, in the wilderness, really, way back. Fish, fish. I’d never had anything like that in my life.

BECKER: And what did you do when you retired? What do you do now?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, I work. I fill in at the post office hours, you know, in between subbing, and stay with the family, the children. I might be home.

LAWRENCE HODGES: But our family was very close-knit.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, yes. I had my family all living in town here. My sister –Edwin Busse’s wife, Elsie, is my sister. I have her, I have my brother and my sister-in-law. I have another sister up in Arlington. I will never get lonesome.

BECKER: That’s right. That’s wonderful.

CHRISTINE HODGES: all the friends that you know. When you live in town that long you know everybody.

BECKER: That’s true. You certainly must have known everybody.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, sure. We knew everybody. It sure changed.

LAWRENCE HODGES: You go to church today, there’s very few of them left that we know.

BECKER: That’s true.

CHRISTINE HODGES: A lot of new people.

BECKER: Well, we have to face that.

CHRISTINE HODGES: The funny part is, they meet me and they ask me, “Are you new here?” I say, “Oh, no, I’m not new.” I said, “You’re new.”

BECKER: Isn’t that something, yes.

LAWRENCE HODGES: So, we’ve had a blessed life. I can say that.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes, we surely did.

LAWRENCE HODGES: And then we get down to Florida and we get all the kids and the children and the great-grandchildren. There are thirty-two of them, down there in Florida.

BECKER: Is that right! So you don’t have any time to sit around down there, either.

LAWRENCE HODGES: They keep us busy. Our daughter has a four-acre farm with a little four-room cottage on the back. It was kind of dilapidated, but I went in there and fixed it all up. Then last year they put in air conditioning, and therein a furnace, and it’s very nice.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, it’s a cute place.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Two horses, two cats, two dogs.

CHRISTINE HODGES: It’s not really a farm, it’s right off of …It’s not really a farm.

LAWRENCE HODGES: No, but I mean, four acres.

CHRISTINE HODGES: They’re taken into the village now. It’s building up all around. Big homes, you know.

BECKER: Where is this now?

LAWRENCE HODGES: Ormand Beach. It’s right near Daytona.

BECKER: And that’s where you go. Do you have a place down there? Is that where you stay down there?

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes. It’s right on her property. We had bought a home but we gave it up. We never moved down there. We thought we’d take it for later, but it was too much work. You’d go down there for the winter, and you’d be raking leaves all winter. Sure. Those leaves drop all winter long.

LAWRENCE HODGES: It was a big house –a four-bedroom house I’d bought down there.

BECKER: Oh, you don’t need that.

LAWRENCE HODGES: The house was eighty-five feet wide. It was a big ranch, all ceramic floors all the way through. I rented it out, and my daughter had to take care of it when we weren’t there, so…

BECKER: Now this is just about the right size for you.

LAWRENCE HODGES: Then my son, when he was in Pennsylvania and he wanted to go back to Florida. He wanted to live in Florida, so he took it over and bought it from me. He lived in there for two or four years, I guess, then he moved out and built himself another place.

BECKER: Well, this has been a most delightful conversation. We’ve just about come to the end of the tape here. I’m sorry I didn’t follow you around while you were making all these comments about all the pictures that we see here. So many of the people you recognize.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Oh, yes.

BECKER: That’s interesting.

CHRISTINE HODGES: Yes, lots and lots.

LAWRENCE HODGES: We were surprised the other night, we had our sixtieth anniversary three years ago, and we had a party down in Florida, too. We had one of these cameras where it picks up the sound, you know?

BECKER: Oh, yes. All the young people have them now.

LAWRENCE HODGES: And so, my daughter brought the tape along, and we showed it the other night. It was good. When I think back even three years, the way those little grandchildren grow. We’ve got ten great-grandchildren and nine grandchildren.

CHRISTINE HODGES: We invited friends that we made since we go down there all the time. We had a real nice.

 

Does MPHS have photographs: No

Date of Interview: Unknown

Interviewer: Unknown

Text of Oral History Interview:

Q: Good morning. This is November 16, 1994. This morning we’re interviewing Mr. Samuel Hess. I want to thank you very much for consenting to the interview. We really appreciate your taking the time to do this for us. We’re going to start with a little bibliography information, and I would like to have your full legal name first.

HESS: Samuel Andrew Hess.

Q: And when and where were you born?

HESS: I was born June 1, 1921, in Detroit, Michigan.

Q: Can you give me your mother’s full name?

HESS: Florence.

Q: And her maiden name was?

HESS: Smith.

Q: Do you know where she was born?

HESS: Yes, Montrose, Pennsylvania.

Q: That’s T-R-O-S-E.

HESS: Yes, R-O-5-E.

Q: And your father’s full name?

HESS: Samuel Peter Hess.

Q: Do you know where he was born?

HESS: Yes, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

Q: I’ll ask about your spouse. Her name is…

HESS: Annabelle.

Q: And where was she born?

HESS: Detroit, Michigan.

Q: If you would like to, I would like to list your children.

HESS: Okay, sure. Andrea Hess.

Q: Okay, you want to give an age?

HESS: Let’s see. Andrea’s forty-one, Annabelle?

ANNABELLE HESS: Yes, she was born in…

HESS: And Mary Hess would be what? Thirty-nine?

ANNABELLE HESS: No, no, no. You’re off. She was born in ’50, and Barbara was born in ’53—- forty-four and forty-one.

HESS: Yes, forty-four and forty-one.

Q: What was your occupation?

HESS: I was a manager for Mobil Oil Corporation.

Q: And how about your spouse?

HESS: Well, she’s a house manager, also –well, she worked for a bank and the children’s clinic early on.

Q: Would you mind telling me of the names of your grandparents?

HESS: Andrew Smith and Cralile Smith –those were the ones in Montrose.

ANNABELLE HESS: Lillian Cralile.

HESS: Well, Lillian Cralile. Then there was Peter Hess. I guess Peter Hess was my other grandfather’s name.

ANNABELLE HESS: Okay, we’ll get back to your other grandmother then. When did you move to Mount Prospect?

HESS: Well, it was twenty-six years ago.

Q: We have your address. Have you ever lived at any other address? Is what I meant to ask.

HESS: In Mount Prospect. No, no other address in Mount Prospect.

Q: How has Mount Prospect changed since you’ve lived here?

HESS: I remember when we bought the house the real estate man said, “Well, we’re at 30,000 now,” and he said, “I’m sure we can’t possibly get any bigger than this.” So, yes, in that sense it’s changed, and then of course the whole area’s become more industrialized and commercialized than previously, although the basic core of the town hasn’t changed that much.

Q: What did you know about Mount Prospect before you came?

HESS: That they had nice elm trees, that’s all. Our place that we had in Detroit had beautiful elm trees, and so when we saw Wapella, Wapella had beautiful elm trees. Of course, we were not experts on the Dutch elm disease, and so unfortunately, shortly after we arrived here they began to deteriorate and even after doing everything under the sun to try to save them it was just not. ..

Q: It was so sad.

HESS: …accomplished. Although I have to say that, and I think this is part of the historical pattern of Mount Prospect, I think that the village has done a very good job in reforestation as evidenced by the fact now a lot of these trees that are the replacements are coming to maturity. ..

Q: And really looking. ..

HESS: …and really looking. ..

Q: …very nice.

HESS: …very nice.

Q: And giving it a nice, settled look again other than the barren look. What are some of the events you remember happening in the village?

HESS: I think one of the things that was kind of interesting to us, and this is not an isolated case, but when we first came to Mount Prospect we of course had come from an area that was a little bit different in its context. It wasn’t really an integrated village like this is, and we got a notice from the mayor inviting us to attend one of the town meetings as new members. That was kind of impressive to us because we had not had that kind of welcoming situation ever before, and that was kind of …

Q: That is very interesting. What do you feel are landmarks in the community?

HESS: Well, of course, your new historical museum is obviously a landmark, although I think more in terms of where the old historical museum was next to the Lutheran –is that a Lutheran church?

Q: Yes, St. John’s.

HESS: St. John’s Lutheran Church, I think of that as kind of a…

Q: They’ll be keeping that, you know. They’re going to turn that. ..

HESS: Yes, right.

Q: …Into a site for field trips and other things, and of course there are big displays there that will probably always remain. Let me ask you a little bit about downtown Mount Prospect. What do you remember most about shopping downtown?

HESS: I think what I remember most was the fact that that happened to be an era of personalized commercial establishments. I guess it was Mieske’s(sic) Market was one of them, and they delivered and very personalized. Then of course we all know about Busse Hardware. There was a shoe store over there on Prospect Avenue, and I was saying to Annabelle the other day, I can’t remember the name of the shop, but it was so different than most shoe places are today where you go in and you have a wide range of shoes and you pick up your own –this was a fellow who took a great deal of care and…

Q: Personalizing that too. How about clothing shopping? Do you remember some of those?

HESS: I don’t think I really did much clothing shopping in Mount Prospect.

Q: Okay, what about hardware items?

HESS: I’m trying to remember if it was the Busse Hardware which was the key hardware and of course very good place to go because you could get really good service, personalized service, which now is an extremely difficult thing. That hardware’s going out of business now, the one on –no, the little one over in the middle of town. That’s Busse Hardware. It’s not the old Busse Hardware, but it has the same name, and they’re going out of business. One of the reasons they’re going out of business is, as he said, people would come in to him to buy the nuts and the bolts and the little items, but the big-ticket items, they’d go to Montgomery Ward or Sears or the big Ace Hardware, whatever.

Q: And he couldn’t really afford to stay in business for nuts and bolts.

HESS: That’s right.

Q: What about things like cars? Where would you have purchased those over the years?

HESS: We have always purchased our cars at Lattoff Chevrolet, which is not in Mount Prospect, but he has a lot of business. He actually was instrumental, the Latoff family of course started that Latoff YMCA and we liked the Chevrolet because it’s got a lot of room and so forth. As a matter of fact, I guess we’ve been doing business with him for twenty-some years.

Q: How about medicine?

HESS: That’s of course the great Keefer establishment, and Jack Keefer was the owner and Jerry runs it, bought it from him, worked for him, and I have a special preference for that kind of a pharmacy because you get personalized attention and they are under, of course, severe duress now because of the big HMOs, the company provisions that you have to buy from a certain place, but they were always and always have been a very great place to buy prescriptions.

Q: Do you remember what some of the other things that the early stores carried besides the drugs at the drug store and the shoes at the shoe store and so on?

HESS: That doesn’t make any impact on me. Maybe it’s because I got up in the morning and went to work and maybe my wife would remember more about that than I do. But if you want to talk about, I suppose, services, of course Louie’s Barber Shop was there –I think Louie has been I business. ..

ANNABELLE HESS: And Adam. Adam has always done all our upholstery.

HESS: Adam’s done all our upholstery and he’s been there a long time, but Louie, I’m sure he’s been in that shop for thirty-five years, and he not only provides haircuts but he is a reservoir of …

ANNABELLE HESS: The cleaners on Prospect Avenue we’ve always gone to.

HESS: …political statements of what’s going on.

Q: And the climate.

HESS: One of the things –this hasn’t anything to do with the recent –I mean it has more to do with recent history than anything else, and that is that to show the changing climate, I remember this Master Craft Cleaners that we go to now, but the first day that they opened business, and they were Chinese from Taiwan, and they had a very, very difficult time even understanding what you were trying to tell them to do with your clothes. Since then they have become very successful, and I think it’s probably a good signal from a historical point of view of the opportunities that are here, not only in Mount Prospect but in the world, for people who have the initiative and so forth because here are people with no educational background, you know, and. ..

Q: Didn’t know the language.

HESS: …didn’t know the language, and they came in and made a great success of a business in Mount Prospect. One of the places that we’ve never been in before, we always were threatening to go in sometime, and that’s that Sam’s Tavern. We’ve never been in it. That’s the one next to the…

ANNABELLE HESS: All our neighbors and friends have.

Q: Okay.

ANNABELLE HESS: Randhurst was brand new when we ________.

HESS: Yes, that was just opened. I suppose when you’re talking about buying things, then if we include Randhurst –I was tending to think of the core of the town –when Randhurst opened, it was really in the vanguard of modem shopping centers. I mean, now you kind of look at it as a more mature, older center, but I mean the ability to walk around in that big. ..

Q: Enclosed.

HESS: …enclosed area and so forth, this was quite. ..

Q: Very unique, it really was.

HESS: …very unique and very different.

Q: It really was quite a nice addition to the community. We’re going to work on grade school memories now. We’ll get to the high school and beyond that later on. Now we’re just working on grade school.

HESS: And this doesn’t have to be Mount Prospect because. ..

Q: No, just what grade did you attend and the years?

HESS: I attended actually an awful lot of the grade school because we were moving around a great deal in the Detroit area. There was Patengill in Detroit.

Q: Gill or Gale?

HESS: Gill. And Doty School in Detroit. And Hally –H-A-L-L- Y. But in those days we were renting and you would go to the school, of course, where you rented.

Q: Okay. Patengill, Doty and Hally.

HESS: Right.

Q: And the years attended would be from first through…

HESS: Through eighth.

Q: What were your favorite subjects or classes?

HESS: Well, I suppose anything that had to do with writing or spelling or English or history, you know, more of an emphasis on that than the mathematical. Mathematics didn’t give me any problems but I was more interested in those things.

Q: Do you remember how far away you lived from each of these schools?

HESS: Actually, I can’t remember the exact distance, but almost all of them were substantial walks. In other words, it isn’t like today, where you either have a bus or a –I mean, they were quite a long walks.

Q: How did you get to school? Walking sounds like the. ..

HESS: Walking.

Q: …the preferred method. Do you remember what time school started?

HESS: I suspect at eight-thirty, but I can’t recall precisely.

Q: Do you remember what time you had to get up in order to be at school in time?

HESS: I think we got up pretty early because my dad was going to work, and we usually got up when he got up, so I would say six-thirty, quarter to seven.

Q: Did you have any chores to do before you went to school, before you left in morning?

HESS: The normal chores of getting the rooms cleaned up and so forth — no monumental chores like milking the cows or anything like that.

Q: Did you eat breakfast before you went to school?

HESS: Absolutely, and obviously that was the time before caloric intake was restrictive so you had a real good breakfast usually.

Q: Do you remember a typical breakfast?

HESS: This, again, was before cholesterol –we were great ones for eggs. Of course, in those days, as you might not remember them, but in those days eggs were considered a staple of life.

Q: Yes, they were.

HESS: If you had a couple of good eggs in you and some toast and…

Q: Milk.

HESS: …and milk and maybe even some sausage, that was considered the fuel to keep the engine going.

Q: Did you bring your lunch to school or go home or …

HESS: A couple of places I brought my lunch, but Annabelle and I were laughing the other day because there was one place where there was a restaurant nearby –I remember the name of it, the Peter Pan Restaurant — and they catered to the younger people, so your parents had given you a certain amount of money and then you’d go in there and buy. ..

Q: And that was in grade school.

HESS: And that was in grade school. ..

Q: My goodness.

HESS: …and today when I think of it, we didn’t think anything of it, you know. There was no security problems and the fellow that ran the Peter Pan Restaurant was very solicitous to the kids. That was later on.

Q: Can you describe a typical lunch?

HESS: One thing I would describe is mashed potatoes and gravy and lots of bread and butter.

Q: Okay, a heavy lunch. Do you remember about how many students you had in your class?

HESS: Oh, I think maybe fifteen to twenty would be certainly maximum in those days.

Q: What was the typical order for the day? Did you start with a special song, prayers or the Pledge of Allegiance?

HESS: I don’t know that in grade school– I think we had certain –we didn’t have a prayer. There were certain –I can’t remember the names of the songs, but there were certain songs we sang and…

Q: Okay. Can you go on to describe a typical day?

HESS: I don’t think I can describe a typical day in eighth grade.

Q: Okay, what did you wear to school? Was there a dress code?

HESS: Yes, there was a dress code in the sense that you were always properly dressed. In those days I do remember there was a period, and I can’t remember what grade you transferred from knickers to long pants, and that was a monumental and I don’t know if you know what knickers are, but, anyway, the boys wore knickers and then when you got to a certain age then you were considered a young man and then you would put on your long pants.

Q: Was there anything your parents refused to let you wear to school?

HESS: I would put it in kind of a general context. I wouldn’t say there was anything specific, but anything that was not, let’s say, proper if that’s the word that can be used. I don’t know if I can use that word, but…

Q: Was refused. I mean that was. ..

HESS: I mean, you wouldn’t wear a wild shirt or a wild sweater or anything like that. It was not a uniform, but it was to a certain degree formal attire.

G; Describe some of the things you did during your play or recess period or any games that were popular. ..

HESS: Well, one of the things, which you don’t see at all nowadays, is marbles, in that early stage. Of course, you had the two kinds of marbles. You had the kind where you would throw the marbles against the wall to see how close you could get, and then there was the other where you had a circle, and the reason that this was played considerably during the recess was because you didn’t need a lot of physical facilities to do it, and there was a great trade that went on between different marbles. You know, you’d trade me two small blue marbles for a big red one and that sort of thing, so it was kind of like the marketplace.

Q: Do you remember any specific songs that were taught and frequently sung at school?

HESS: I don’t think I can.

Q: What art and crafts projects were done at school that were especially memorable?

HESS: The thing that I remember most of all, and it was really an impractical thing, they had a print shop program, and why they had it I don’t particularly know, except in those days I guess they figured that you should assume some sort of dexterity and you put your hand up and actually plug the type into the hole there. Of course, they had wood shop, and you made little items like knickknacks.

Q: Did you have a favorite teacher, and why did you like him or her?

HESS: I remember the high school teachers. I don’t think I remember too much about the grade school teachers.

Q: How would you answer this –I will never forget the day at grade school when…?

HESS: It’s interesting that you say grade school because I would have to include kindergarten, and I remember making butter, which is kind of a stupid thing to remember, but I remember for some reason or other that the kindergarten teacher decided that we should make butter, and we made it in the class.

Q: That is interesting, isn’t it? What did you do after school in the way of chores or work or play?

HESS: First of all, the chores very often were related to things like having a magazine route or a newspaper route, and the chores that you did around the house were probably not as monumental. They were more custodial –in other words, keep your room clean or don’t leave things around. The recreational activities were more pick-up stuff.

Q: Okay, that’s the hang-out kind of thing. What did you do in your free time?

HESS: Well, you would play an awful lot of baseball and football, but it was quite different than it is today where the parents take their kids out to a formal soccer game or a formal football…

Q: It would be a pick-up.

HESS: Yes, it would be a pick-up because there were a lot of vacant lots around, and so there was a lot of spontaneity involved in it.

Q: What school did you attend for junior high and high school?

HESS: That would be Post Intermediate, would be the one in between.

Q: And how about high school?

HESS: That would be Highland Park High School in Highland Park, Michigan.

Q: What special memories do you hold about junior high or high school?

HESS: I think that the teachers in high school were what you would call the individuals who were as dedicated high school teachers as a minister might be dedicated or a doctor, whatever. Like a Latin teacher, you know, today people say why in the world would anybody take Latin? Yet the Latin teacher was a –Dan Loon was his name, and he was a very disciplined person. The Latin proved to be a disciplinary exercise that taught you a great deal. And the French teacher, I remember Madame Lampa was –I remember when I went to Amherst and they took the introductory course to see what your status would be in the French course, I was amazed at how effective she’d been. So I think what they were is they were a very high professional caliber, and the counseling department was a woman who, very, very impressive person, white hair, and her name was Babcock, and she really felt a great responsibility to try to direct people to the appropriate college or the appropriate field of endeavor and so forth.

Q: Which was wonderfully important back…

HESS: Very important.

Q: …then as it is today.

HESS: It is today. The only problem today, I guess they’re faced with such a large volume of…

Q: ________________.

HESS: Our church brought over a bunch of Vietnamese from the old country, and one of the things that concerned us was that although the counselors were very good in a way, their counseling in the case of the Vietnamese was very much influenced by the affirmative action program. Like the one chap was encouraged to go to a college where he never should have gone, because they were trying to get affirmative action incidence in the college, and so they offered him a good scholarship, but he didn’t last very long. He never should have been sent there. So they were influenced to a certain degree by that program. The choosing of a college in the old days was quite different than it is today. Today is quite a scientific procedure. They have the counselors come from the different colleges, and you analyze the courses and everything. The only reason I went to Amherst was because when I graduated from high school there happened to be an Episcopal minister in one of the Episcopal churches nearby who had been to Amherst, and he talked very positively about the college and so forth. So we went out there and looked at it. Of course, it had been a college that was well recognized as being high academic background and so forth. The interesting thing is that culturally, it was the home area of Emily Dickinson. As a matter of fact, when our fraternity that I was a member of was historically –well, it was Calvin Coolidge’s fraternity when he was at Amherst, and it was right up on the top of a hill, and the Emily Dickinson house was right at the bottom of the hill. So when I would go to class, I would walk right by the Emily Dickinson house, and Emily Dickinson’s niece lived there, and she was also a poet and also kind of a recluse. The interesting thing about the Calvin Coolidge relationship there, every year we would have a dinner, and the fellow that pledged Calvin Coolidge to the fraternity would come back and visit. He had the same speech every year, but the criteria for the speech was, you never can tell somebody by somebody’s appearance what they’re going to do later in life, because he told about Calvin Coolidge was a young farm boy from Northampton and he was a good friend of this lawyer who later became successful in Boston, and he wanted Calvin Coolidge in the fraternity but nobody else wanted him because he was not dynamic, as he never was later, even when he was president. They had a system then they called “the black balls,” so this gentleman said, “Well, if you won’t take Calvin Coolidge, I will vote against all of these special guys that you want to bring into the fraternity.” So of course they took Calvin Coolidge and he became president of the United States, so the philosophy just indicating that you never can tell what the story is.

Q: What was the fraternity, would you mind answering?

HESS: Phi Gamma Delta.

Q: Fiji?

HESS: Right.

Q: Our son is a Fiji.

HESS: Oh, is he? That’s interesting. Very good. Oh, we are the marching, marching Fiji men. Those were the war years, so we went through college in a little over three years. Almost all of the people that were in that class were going to go on to war. It’s always quite interesting when you look at the situation in those days and you think of these people who –well, I won’t say they were spoiled, but they certainly were not any type of person that you would normally select to be a soldier. Then of course at the end of their college career they went off to all kinds of …

Q: To train for the military.

HESS: For the military, which was quite a monumental change from this quiet little New England college to the battlefield, which is always kind of interesting that the United States was able to make that transition, or the men involved were.

Q: Yes, I imagine that was a very big change for most of them, and the training period –how strenuous was the military training?

HESS: I took infantry training and that was quite strenuous. Then I was in the invasion of Letei and the invasion of Okinawa, later then at the occupation of Korea where we occupied after the war.

Q: Do you have a little more to say about then a few of your days after college and your college experience at Amherst? How did it serve you?

HESS: The educational process, and there’s always been a strong battle about this in educational circles, the education at Amherst of course was liberal arts education, and I think that in terms of even the business environment, in the decision-making mechanism, that that kind of education is very, very important in developing leadership. I think that we have maybe gotten away a little too much from that in the sense that everything is very specific nowadays. Yet if you’re looking at the new philosophy of work, where people have to be able to do all kinds of different things, it’s going to be increasingly difficult to have any specific courses in college that are going to prepare you for what you’re going to be doing. You mentioned your son-in-law or son that was a geologist and then he does certain things that are related to that, but they’re peripherally related to it. Then the other thing I think it does do, if one looks at the philosophy that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, the. ..

[Side 2]

HESS: …I think that the Chicago & North Western has helped to really develop all of these towns, you know. They’re on time, they’re very efficient, and I think that this has been a major factor in the. ..

Q: Development.

HESS: Mount Prospect, from a historical point of view, the one dark cloud on the horizon is the downtown area. It is still a very serious problem. They’re doing a lot of things. They’re -in the new condominium complex up here on Northwest Highway and so forth, but there’s a lot of vacant shops and part of this is due to the fact that the landlords keep raising the rents, and I don’t deny them the right to raise the rent because they own the property, but there’s not enough volume of business in these small shops to really justify the rentals. …After all of the discord and bitterness and political in-fighting and so forth,the library was finally completed and reflected a lot of enthusiasm on the part of the population, so all’s well that’s ends well, and that was a satisfying thing to see.

Q: Very fond memory, I’m sure, to see that go up and be replacing the old building, Central School. Is there anything you’d like to add about living in Mount Prospect?

HESS: I think the thing that’s interesting about Mount Prospect, the thing that’s good about Mount Prospect is the diversity of its population. I don’t want to in any way demean any other suburb because I know they all have their assets, but I think Mount Prospect has a lot of young people, they have a lot of senior citizens, they have people that are very well-to-do, they have people that are not too well-to-do, and, to be quite frank about it, they are even faced with some with real gang problems and minority problems and so forth and so on, so you’re really living in a microcosm of our society and to a certain degree I think that keeps everybody on their toes.

Q: Is there one thing you’d like your children to remember about the history of their home town? What would it be?

HESS: Well, they used to have a phrase, “Where neighborliness is a way of life.” That was the phrase –I think that was the phrase, wasn’t it, Annabelle, something like that?

A: It used to be down here on the _____________.

HESS: Yes, I think “Neighborliness is a way of life” or “Friendliness is a way of life.” I think that generally that I would like my children to remember Mount Prospect as a place where, notwithstanding the discord and problems and so forth, it was basically a friendly town.

Q: In what respect is Mount Prospect the same now as it was in the past?

HESS: Well, I think it’s the same. I give your historical society a great deal of credit to this. I think it’s the same in the sense that it has a lot of sensitivity to historical things, I mean, the fact that they put out a booklet on the history of Mount Prospect and the fact that they put so much effort and energies into their historical society, so with all the Kensington industrial complex and a lot of these other things, they have not lost their sense of history, and I think from that point of view it’s still the same.

Q: I want to thank you very much for consenting to be interviewed.

HESS: I don’t know that you’ve got what you want from me, but…

Q: Well, I think we’ve gotten a lot of. ..

HESS: …as a matter of fact, when Annabelle said, “Did you call?” I said, “Well, I don’t know. She may be very disappointed in talking to me,” because I don’t think that I…

Q: Not at all. And if there’s anything else that you’d like to say extemporaneously now. ..

HESS: No, no, that’s –of course, you’re a very good interviewer. I suppose what you do with all of this, you take it like –which is nice about the way the system works nowadays –you can take all this group of things and pick out the things that seem to have a common denominator. ..

Q: And, yes, work it in…

HESS: …and work it into a dialogue.

Q: Yes, well, we certainly do appreciate the fact that both of you, the two of you have really added an awful lot.

HESS: Thank you for coming.

Q: Thank you so much.