Mrs. Kelly and Mr. Powers are first cousins.
Joanna – My name is Joanna Kelley. I was born in Concord, Massachusetts on June 29, 1901. My father was born in White Plains, New York on March 17, 18-something, and my mother was born in County Waterford, Ireland on February 8, 18-something. And I have lived in Concord, Massachusetts all my life. I went to school here, married here. I have five children - four daughters and one son, fifteen grandchildren, and four great-grandchildren. My father's last name was Tobin, and my mother's name was Bridget Anne Curran. My father was a farmer by occupation.
... Where abouts was the farm?
Joanna – He worked with different farmers when he first came to Concord, and he wound up buying a farm on Sudbury Road. And he had cows, a milk brood, a few horses. He worked hard. A couple of my brothers helped him. And then, we all went to St. Bernard's Church in Concord, the Catholic church.
...Can you tell me something about growing up in terms of where you went to school and some of the things that you remember doing together?
Joanna – I went to the grade schools, and I graduated from Concord High School. Then World War I came along in 1917-18, and I worked with the Red Cross during that time making bandages and sweaters and I made a lot of sweaters, and they went overseas. I was very happy as a teenager to receive some of the letters I got from these different fellows who were in the service, and they liked the sweater I had made.
And then we used to go to dances down at Monument Hall. Some of the soldiers from Fort Devens would come down and we'd have a lot of fun.
And then our parents, maybe once a month or once every few months, would have what they called "a kitchen racket". In other words, it was really a dance in a kitchen. And there would be some man who would play the accordion. Another might play a fiddle or a violin. And they had the greatest time. And I can remember my father, I was very young, but I can remember he had a sort of big post down cellar to make sure that the floors wouldn't go through with all the people doing their dancing. They'd roll a big barrel of beer into the cellar. They'd all have a good time drinking that.
Another person who is going to tell you a few things now is a first cousin of mine and his name is James Powers. He also lives in Concord, and I'll let you hear from him now.
James – OK, Joanna. Well, I was born in Franklin, New Hampshire on October 15, 1907. My parents both came from Ireland, born in County Waterford, over there. My father was born in Ring, and my mother was born in Youghal. They both worked for a living. Even when I was growing up, my mother worked out as a maid here and there around the town. She did washings, and that sort of thing. And my father worked on the lawns. They call them a landscape gardener today. But like on a Monday, he'd work on one estate, and Tuesday he'd work on another, and so on through the week. He and another fellow had a partnership in that business, and they did very well. He was quite happy doing it.
Getting back to the "kitchen rackets" that you mentioned for just a moment, I wonder if you remember that the first thing they did before the dances started ... all the heat in those days was by kitchen stoves .... and the first thing the men would do was take down the pipe in the stove, and then the men would pick up that big heavy stove - usually a Glenwood, I remember - and walk it out the door and out into the yard so the stove would be out of the way. And there'd be a keg of beer in the cellar, brought in particularly for that affair. I never saw anybody intoxicated and all the dancing was eight-hand-around sort of thing, and as you say, someone played a violin, and particularly an accordion. And my father was an accordion player, so I attended many, many, many "kitchen rackets" and certainly have fond memories of that.
As far as growing up, I grew up in an area called "back of the Depot" and it was a very interesting area because there was all kinds of nationalities represented, and no problem whatsoever as far as one nationality considering itself better than another or anything like that.
We used to play baseball up at the cattle grounds or on the streets those days. Of course you can't do that today. You'd get run over. But we played baseball, and if an argument came up amongst the kids, if you happened to be arguing with an Italian boy, you'd call him a "guinea" or a" dago", and he'd call you a "thick harp". To a Swede, you'd call him a "squarehead" or if you were a down-easter [Nova Scotia] they'd call you a "herron-choker" and that was the way it was and five minutes after the game, that was all forgotten. There was no big deal about it, and certainly the whole neighborhood couldn't have been closer. In fact that closeness still continues to this day with those of us who are left. If one dies, everybody shows up no matter how far they have to come to go to that wake, they come for some reason or other. It was a very closely knit area.
I would say that the problem was not ethnic so much amongst the working class people or their children growing up. I would say that it was more consciousness of religious background and political background. All the working people "back of the Depot" in the majority were the Democrats, and they actually were timid about expressing their views if they were Democrats for fear they might lose their jobs for their bosses invariably were Republicans, and they had the feeling that it wasn't safe to wave that fact around, that they were Democrats, and they just avoided it at all times. They might talk in the kitchen, but outside there was no political talk. And I remember particularly amongst the Irish when James Michael Curley came along, he was the hero on the quotes, as it were. They were delighted with him doing what he was able to do because he represented them in getting up toward the top.
And then, on the religious side, that was a very strong thing and both sides - all denominations - were guilty of capitalizing on that at that time. I remember there was a Boy Scout troop and one priest didn't want the kids to join the Boy Scouts because the meetings were held in one of the Protestant churches at that time, and there was the feeling that they might swing over a few of the kids from the Catholic religion. That's how small the whole approach was. There were many of us who rebelled at some of this over the years.
Joanna – You don't remember Phil Greg's wedding, do you?
James – No.
Joanna – Well, I do. There was this couple getting married in the ME Church. It was on Thoreau Street in Concord. We kids so wanted to see that bride getting married, but we wouldn't dare tell our parents because we were forbidden to go inside the Protestant church. But we did go. And we did see the bride and groom and were very happy about it. And then we were frightened to death to ever go to confession and tell the priest that we had been to the Protestant church. Thank heavens all that now is altogether different, and we all mingle in. It-doesn't make any difference - color, creed - or whatever you are and everybody seems to get along very, very nicely, and that's the way it should be.
But, getting back to the Catholic religion, and so forth, because I am a Catholic, brought up in the Catholic church, well, I'm just very glad that things have changed to the way they are right now, today, which is the way it should be. Everybody be friends, be together, help one another, do what you can to help one another. That's my theory, and, as I say, I'm getting along in years now. When I look back and think of all the things we've gone through, my parents were hard-working people, they had a big family. When my brother Walter - he was only 17 years old when he went to France during World War I - broke my mother's heart. He lied about his age. He and another fellow, Mike Towler, they both went into the army. The next week when this recruiting officer was down there, they both filled up on bananas and drank up a lot of water so that they surely did pass the exam that night because they were the right weight. They were shipped to France, and my brother Walter was taken very seriously ill in the trenches. He was in the hospital for months and months. My mother hadn't heard one word to know whether he was dead or alive until finally one neighbor - his name was Mulcahey - he wrote to his mother and wanted to know if Walter Tobin had arrived home yet, and that was the first that we knew that he was even alive.
And of course when the boys all came home from France, that was great for us teenagers. They had dances at the Armory, and my mother would let me go, and we had great times. One time during World War I when it first started, they had tents up in the cattle show which James has talked about. And years ago, I guess, they got that name because they used to have regular cattle shows there. The people would bring their pigs and their goats and cows and so on to this cattle show.
Also, when I was young, there used to be a circus come to Concord, and they always would put up at the cattle show, the Barnum & Bailey Circus. That was lots of fun for us kids. I think the kids today are missing a great deal. I don't know what they can be telling their grandchildren or great-grandchildren like I can tell mine because everything today is "just push a button" and you've got whatever you want.
...What about your real estate business, Mr. Powers. That certainly must have put you in touch over the years with people's attitudes and values. What has Powers Real Estate shown you in terms of how people have felt in this town about ...
James – Well, they were afraid. It's like everything else. They were afraid of the unknown, and when I started in the business, Italians were beginning to come to the town. They weren't really welcomed. I remember giving a talk on this one time about the negroes beginning to come to Concord. We in Concord had no experience with the black people, as they're called today, whatsoever. No knowledge of them or anything. As I said at a meeting where I spoke one night, when the Irish came to this town, they came here as result of building the railroad through here, from what I read. And some of them stayed, and then more came, and the so-called yankees, the original people here, after the indians, I suppose, the yankees looked down their nose at the Irish people, and the Irish felt that they were being looked down their nose. In my time, when I started in real estate some thirty-five or forty years ago, Italians were beginning to come here to buy homes. And some of them bought, and the yankees looked down their nose at the Italians. And as I said at the meeting, but they had some help because the Irish looked down their nose at the Italians too. And it wasn't many years, then, before some Jewish people began to come into the town. And the same thing happened. And I pointed out that the yankees now were looking down their nose at the Irish, at the Italians, and now they had to enlarge their scope and take in the Jews, but they had more help too because not only the Irish but the Italians were looking down their nose at the Jews.
And I said, now it's come to the point where some negro people are coming to town and we're going through the same cycle that we've gone through many times. And, as I said then, that too will change and they'll be looking down their nose at maybe Puerto Ricans or somebody else as they start an influx into the town.
Joanna – Remember the first colored people? The man and wife? They worked at a house almost opposite to where you live on Main Street. They used to come to Hayes's.
James – Oh yes.
Joanna – We thought the world of those people. I think they were the first black people that came to Concord. That's a long time ago.
James – There were some very interesting experiences in the business,
believe me! The prejudice against some of these people was fantastic
on the part of a few individuals in the town, not the town as a
whole. But my goodness, when you run into it! Well, you asked about
in the real estate business, was it evident. I can give you what I
call a classic example of that. I had a young couple come in one
time looking for a house, and they were accompanied by the girl's
mother. The woman who worked for me took these people out and showed
them some houses and they came back and they obviously had pretty
well settled on a house up in so-called Elm Park here in Concord.
And as the young couple were talking to my salesgirl, the woman asked
if she could have a word with me and I said, "Sure," and we went into a back room, and she said, "Mr. Powers, I've got a question to ask
you. Are there many ... are there many ... oh, dear ... it's so
difficult to put it into words." I said, "Jewish people?" because at
the moment that was the thing that was being downplayed was the
Jewish people. And she said, "Yes." I said, "No, by golly, there
aren't ... as a matter of fact I can only think of two Jewish people
in the town." That was a bit of a lie but I was having a little fun.
I said, "There's Maxie Arkin the tailor, and there's George Fingold,
the attorney general."
Now I had placed a man at both ends of the ladder, the bottom and the top and so she didn't object to either one of those. They were all right. She just didn't want the general population to be Jewish. And so she said, "My town was a lovely town but in that town there was an influx of Catholics that spoiled the town." And I said, "Is that so?" She apparently didn't realize I was Catholic. And she said, "Yes. It was all right until they put a Catholic school in there and all the Catholics came into the town. I will say that they were doctors and engineers and that sort of thing. But they soon wanted to get on to town boards and what they wouldn't give to get on a board. As a matter of fact, one of them ran for office there and Mr. Powers, the only way we were able to beat him was with a whispering campaign." And I said, "Is that a fact?" [Tape was erased here - Jim describes how he put his client "in her place" by describing how destructive and absurd prejudice is.]
The woman stood there, staring at me as if in shock for a moment and suddenly she realized I had been pulling her leg, and she swung around and out the door she went and grabbed her daughter and pulled her out the door and we lost a sale.
...That was a sale you didn't mind losing, I bet.
James – In listening to the replay of what we've said, I think there's one thing there that I don't think we should leave this taping with the idea that there was any resentment that carried through. I've always thought of Concord as my home town, boy, and it's a good one. And I'm sure Joanna felt the same way. Despite these things as you single them out, they sound like the whole town was that way. I'm sure none of us would have wanted to have grown up anywhere else. The town was a country town at the time. Everybody in the town knew everybody else, knew his physical standing, his financial standing, his religious standing and everything but political, you might say. You could guess at the political, but it wasn't going to be said out loud - that is, when we were little kids. That passed, of course, in due time. I think it was one of the grandest towns, and I'm happy to say that most of that prejudice that was so prevalent in a picayune way has disappeared from the scene, in my opinion. I'm almost seventy-five years. Joanna, you're a lot older than that. How old are you?
Joanna – Well, I'm almost eighty-one.
James – What do you think of it?
Joanna – Well, I feel the same way that you do. And I'm so glad that this bigotry and this hate is a thing of the past right now. And everybody's out trying to help each other. That's the way it should be and not like when we were teenagers, starting to grow up, we had to be very choosy about who we chummed with. And religion was really brought into it, which was really a shame. I don't go along with it and never did.
James – I think, in looking back, that the big change is due to population increase. That's all. In the old days we knew everybody in the town, as I've said before, and we cared for everybody in the town. That held true of everybody. Everybody cared whether the man was wealthy or poor, if he was sick, everybody was concerned; or if he was having financial problems, everyone was concerned and they did things on the quiet those days. Money was raised quietly and nobody knew how it was done or anything else, but people were taken care of. Unfortunately today the town has grown to such an extent that you cannot possibly know everybody in the town and I think the basic feeling of caring is here; it's demonstrated in this "Clean Sweep" that's going on right now where everybody is pitching in and going out on the street a week from Saturday, cleaning up the streets of the town. There'll be hundreds of volunteers out there, doing just that, and that's typical Concord operation. We think nothing of it. We think it's great. And I think that's what's made Concord great, that feeling of a great big family. I think that about says everything.