Densho Digital Archive - Kerry Christenson Powell Interview (denshovh-pkerry-01-0003)

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KL: Let's back up a little bit to before your birth, and I wanted to hear whatever knowledge you have of what your dad's work was like and what his tasks were. Did you say he first worked at Bartlett?

KP: No, he worked at NSP, which was National Soda Products, which is actually where I was born. That was just south of Keeler. And it was in barracks, kind of barracks-like homes, some of 'em were pretty nice looking, and they were a little bit bigger than a barracks, actual barracks. And my aunt and uncle lived there too, because my dad's brother worked there also, on that side of the lake, on the Keeler side of the (Owens) lake. So it would have been kind of dirty, dusty work, mining the soda products or whatever they were mining out of the lake.

KL: Do you know any of the techniques that they used?

KP: No, I really don't. I know when he worked at Bartlett they would go out and check the water that was, the product that was leaching out of the water, he would do that, but then he ended up working in the towers, which he called the towers. And also in a lab (at that plant).

KL: Is that at the Pittsburgh Plate Glass?

KP: At Pittsburgh Plate Glass (plant).

KL: He was all over.

KP: Yeah. He came over and worked at Bartlett's after a while, and then he drove to Bartlett for many, many years, from Lone Pine after we moved to Lone Pine.

KL: How long did he work for NSP? Do you have a sense of that? I guess it would have been about...

KP: Probably eight or ten years. I remember the town a little bit, there was a swimming pool there.

KL: In NSP?

KP: And there was a tennis court in Keeler (next to NSP), and they played tennis a lot between their fishing excursions.

KL: And I guess he probably came about 1927?

KP: Yeah.

KL: Was he affected at all by the bank collapse, the Watterson Brothers bank collapse?

KP: No, I don't think so, because they probably didn't have that much money in the bank to worry about. They probably barely broke even. I wouldn't know about that at all.

[Interruption]

KL: Your dad's work, was he actually mining the soda?

KP: Yes, probably. I don't know whether he actually was out there shoveling anything, because I really never understood the process. You'd have to talk to (my cousin) Don Christenson about that if you can ever catch him.

Off camera: That would be good, yeah.

KP: My cousin, because he was older and a boy and he understood more about it. And his dad worked longer at NSP.

KL: Did your grandmother do any work for NSP or any work for pay in the Owens Valley?

KP: No. All they did was a bed and breakfast thing.

KL: And did they establish that right away?

KP: And when they finally... yes, soon as they came here, as far as I know. Once they outgrew that, which would have been, I don't know how many years they ran it, the lake changed, too, and the jobs changed and they went across the lake and so forth and so forth. They moved, she and her daughter moved to Placerville, (California), and worked up there in various things. She was, of course, a very good cook, Swedish cook. They were very good cooks, I should say. And then my dad, of course, was married.

KL: How did your folks meet?

KP: Well, they probably just met when they were looking out for each other, boys and girls were looking out for each other. [Laughs] Go to the post office and meet Ruth, and finally ask her for a date. You know how that would go in those days. And I'm sure her parents weren't too happy about it, because he was not from there, he was not from Soledad, he was from up here. But, of course, my grandparents loved to come up here and fish, too, later on, which they did.

KL: When did your folks marry?

KP: Oh, dear. [Laughs] What did I say? I was born when she was twenty, and so they had to be married in 1930, '31.

KL: And when were you born?

KP: '33. They were married in Acton, in a really darling little church in Acton, down below Palmdale, (California).

KL: Did your mother ever tell you anything about her pregnancy or your birth?

KP: Well, the birth was pretty tough because there was a midwife (at home) and she wanted me to wait until the doctor got there, so she was trying to keep me from being born. [Laughs] So my mother had kind of a hard time. I don't know whether the doctor got there in time or not, I don't think so. In the house, at home, and in the barracks at NSP. So after that, of course, my sister (Luella) was born three years later, and then we moved to Lone Pine when she was a baby for the schools and so forth.