Densho Digital Archive - Melvyn Juhler Interview (denshovh-jmelvyn-01-0003)

<Begin Segment 3>

KP: So what, what kind of, what kind of background did your father have? He was...

MJ: Well, he, like I said, he would, he had a high school education --

KP: Uh-huh.

MJ: --- in San Francisco and then he went to a mechanics school, like a trade school. And his sister, Etta, she went to Heals College. So they both got some kind of a little formal education. And then when they came to Spreckels of course they took over, they took the store. He, he bought the store.

KP: But his intent of going --

MJ: I don't know what he did in mechanics there, if he did anything. But the mechanics certainly helped him as being a farmer. 'Cause he did all his own mechanical work, so he enjoyed mechanics. So I would say that's probably all he did in the mechanics. I know he delivered groceries and you know, and then like I say he just didn't like that at all. It wasn't what he wanted to do.

KP: So he gets this, this land. And I asked about where the land came from because you said it wasn't the best land. It wasn't the worst land, but it wasn't the best land.

MJ: That's right. It...

KP: Do you think he was, was it a good deal that he got?

MJ: Well, that's right. Because it flooded you, you can't grow crops all year round. You couldn't put a winter crop in of any kind. So he raised, in the summer he raised lettuce and then for a second crop he, he'd get sugar beets in, if the weather was... but, like I say, when it flooded well then you couldn't do anything with it. So, it was a better buy. He had a chance, from what I understand, to buy something out by the Salinas River. And it was better ground and it was, wasn't a chance of flooding every year, but there was a chance someday that the river might take it away 'cause it was right next to the river. And you never knew what that river was gonna do. So he chose the piece in Carr Flat which he knew was always gonna be there. It wasn't gonna go anywhere. And I'd say he made the smart decision because the town didn't take it over either because it's a flood zone. It's still there today. It's still being farmed today.

KP: And, when he was farming, is this a dry land farming? Just depending on rains?

MJ: Uh-huh. Well, no, no. It, he had irrigation. All row crops. It was all irrigation. He had plenty of water because that dish was always full of water and then he had well pumps that he, that he watered with. He had hired help. He had Mexican laborers. He had a foreman, a Mexican foreman. He had two different ones, Ted Azivito and Steve... I can't remember his last name. But when I was a kid, I remember 'em. They always played with me and they were real nice guys. So yeah, he had a foreman out there all the time. And then of course when we moved to San Benancio, the little house, the foreman lived in the house. They had a, they had a home of their own.