Page 1 of 21 
 
Washington Women’s Heritage Project records, 1900-2000 
University of Washington Libraries Special Collections 
Freda Strom Charley 
1981  
Cassette 1, Side 2 
 
 
Winona Weber  00:02 
--try to forget [?mine?].  
 
Freda Charley  00:03 
Long time ago, [inaudible] we had dances when I was a kid. We had gas lights. [?Horton and 
Harris DePalma?], one would play the mouth harp and one would play the accordion. [Laughter]. 
 
Winona Weber  00:05 
That sounds like fun. 
 
Freda Charley  00:20 
Dance the whole night.  
 
Winona Weber  00:22 
Where would you dance? 
 
Freda Charley  00:23 
Oh, they had a-- [?Silas Hall?] had a pool hall down by Shale's house. And that's where we used 
to dance, by lantern light. Or at the school. 
 
Winona Weber  00:36 
Yeah. 
 
Freda Charley  00:37 
[Inaudible] we'd have just lanterns for gas. They had those Aladdin lights and the gas lights. 
 
Winona Weber  00:44 
Oh, yeah. Was that the school that was down where the administration office is now? 
 
Freda Charley  00:50 
Yeah.  
 
Winona Weber  00:51 
Page 2 of 21 
 
Yeah, that's where that is. And I remember the old gym. 
 
Freda Charley  00:54 
And then the [?Joaquineses?] used to have a big house down there, and they had a-- they built a 
dance hall on their house, and they had a piano. A player piano. [Inaudible] all night there. Mrs. 
[?Joaquines?] would always have coffee and sandwiches and stuff. [Inaudible] just, I guess, 
community, you know, [inaudible]. And then we used to have nice Christmas, Christmases here. 
Lots gifts for the kids. 
 
Winona Weber  01:06 
Oh. Oh, that's fun.  
 
Freda Charley  01:37 
Big dinners. Different now, everything's different. 
 
Winona Weber  01:44 
[Inaudible]. One thing I noticed when I-- you know, I've been interviewing. Some of the women 
I interviewed live off reservations and some of the women I would interview lived on the 
reservations. You know, up in Nisqually, or Muckleshoot, or someplace like that. [Inaudible] if I 
want to find a woman that's living on one of the Rez, all I have to do is I-- well, I can go to all 
the smoke shop, or something like that, and I'll ask them, "Hey, I'm trying to find so-and-so." 
And they'll-- either they'll know, or someone else in the shop will know where they are. And, 
"Oh, yeah, you know, you go over there, da-da-da." And I'll go and I'll find 'em. I go-- Well, I 
was trying to find someone to Pacific Beach, Josephine Oliver.  
 
Freda Charley  01:44 
Yeah.  
 
Winona Weber  01:53 
And I asked someone there, because I wasn't sure where her house was. I said, "Is that where 
Josephine and Jim Oliver live?" "Oh, I don't know."  
 
Freda Charley  02:55 
[Laughs].  
 
Winona Weber  02:57 
Didn't know. No one knew them. And I have trouble finding people.  
 
Freda Charley  03:01 
Did you find them?  
 
Winona Weber  03:02 
Mm-hmm. Oh, yeah, I talked to her. And it's real easy to find people if you know their name on 
the reservations, but you get off, and there isn't-- 
 
Freda Charley  03:14 
Page 3 of 21 
 
No way, huh? 
 
Winona Weber  03:15 
Yeah, I guess 'cause people don't know each other.  
 
Freda Charley  03:18 
It is-- they kind of live by themselves, or something. But Jim and [?Jo?], they're-- they've been 
there a long time. They raised-- well, they lived here in [?Jane's?] house for a while. Then they 
moved to Pacific Beach. Worked for the government.  
 
Winona Weber  03:38 
Oh really?  
 
Freda Charley  03:40 
He graduated when I did from Chemawa.  
 
Winona Weber  03:43 
Oh, really?  
 
Freda Charley  03:44 
We were classmates.  
 
Winona Weber  03:46 
Yeah, he said that.  
 
Freda Charley  03:47 
Oh did he? [Laughs].  
 
Winona Weber  03:48 
Yeah, thinking about it. Well, we talked about all kinds of stuff. He was telling me about that. 
How old were you when you went away to Chemawa? About 14?  
 
Freda Charley  04:01 
About 14.  
 
Winona Weber  04:07 
[Inaudible].  
 
Freda Charley  04:08 
Yeah.  
 
Winona Weber  04:10 
Boy. What did you think when you getting shipped off way down there? 
 
Freda Charley  04:17 
Page 4 of 21 
 
Oh, I went with my brother took me. My brother Ole. And when we landed at the depot there 
was the band was there, and all the students that were in Chemawa that got there, I guess, they all 
came to meet him, 'cause he was always the captain of the football team, and [?wrestling?] team 
and what have you, and--  
 
Winona Weber  04:40 
Yeah. 
 
Freda Charley  04:41 
Gosh, they came and they grabbed him and they were [inaudible] him around on their shoulders. 
[Inaudible] my god. I didn't [inaudible]. I was standing there and I didn't know what to do, and 
pretty soon, "Hey, let me down. I got a little sister here. I gotta take the office." [Laughs]. Yeah, 
he was quite a guy that my brother. Really something.  
 
Winona Weber  05:03 
I've heard of him.  
 
Freda Charley  05:04 
He was an officer, too, and you know when we'd go to-- we'd march. We had to march to school; 
we had to march to church; we had to march everywhere. We had real military-- and he was one 
of the officers, anyway. He was a captain. And he was always barking, barking the orders 
[inaudible]. Sunday, we get up at 6:00 and have a dress parade in full dress. And he'd be out 
there, "Right, left, [inaudible]," you know, "[inaudible]." Giving orders out there. 
 
Winona Weber  05:43 
Did your feet get tangled up on you when you were trying to follow [inaudible]? 
 
Freda Charley  05:46 
Oh, I'd get tired. Yeah, it was so long. Especially when the officers from Fort Lewis used to 
come down, then we'd all have to have a parade on the football field to select the best 
[inaudible], you know, all that jazz. They'd have silent [?drill?] and everything [inaudible]. Real 
military. And it was a good school then, because they had discipline. 
 
Winona Weber  05:47 
Yeah, a lot of discipline. My cousin Susan [?Moore?] -- 'course she was Susan [?Cain?], then--  
 
Freda Charley  06:28 
Yeah.  
 
Winona Weber  06:30 
--she said she knew you then.  
 
Freda Charley  06:31 
Yeah. She-- no, she knew my brother, Ole.  
 
Winona Weber  06:31 
Page 5 of 21 
 
Oh, she knew your--  
 
Freda Charley  06:31 
I think she's gone, now, I think. 
 
Winona Weber  06:38 
Yeah, that's right. She said she knew Ole. 
 
Freda Charley  06:40 
They eloped, you know. They were gonna go and get married, but they told them-- when they 
went to get their license, they told them, "Come back in two, three years. You're too young." 
[Laughs].  
 
Winona Weber  06:51 
[Laughs]. Yeah, that's what she said.  
 
Freda Charley  06:53 
She almost got to be my sister in law.  
 
Winona Weber  06:56 
Yeah. And then she went to Seattle and forgot him, I guess [laughs].  
 
Freda Charley  07:01 
Yes. [Inaudible] [?Moore?]. Ran away. [?Jim Bryson?] and some girl, I can't remember.  
 
Winona Weber  07:10 
Oh, she [crosstalk].  
 
Freda Charley  07:12 
And Ole and Susan [laughs]. What kids'll do.  
 
Winona Weber  07:23 
Did you come home every summer when you were...? 
 
Freda Charley  07:25 
Oh yeah. Came home, worked. Went back again. 
 
Winona Weber  07:35 
How did you get into the school? 
 
Freda Charley  07:39 
[Crosstalk]. 
 
Winona Weber  07:39 
No, I mean into Chemawa [inaudible] school. 
 
Page 6 of 21 
 
Freda Charley  07:42 
Oh, it just seemed that that's the only place there was to go after you got to eighth grade. Or you 
could go to Moclips, but they-- you had to have your own transportation. Uh-huh, yeah, there 
was a road then.  
 
Winona Weber  08:00 
Oh, I see.  
 
Freda Charley  08:00 
It was road then. It was awful rough road, but it was a road. But I'd rather go to Chemawa.  
 
Winona Weber  08:14 
[Inaudible].  
 
Freda Charley  08:14 
Yeah, all kinds of people there. There was over 1000 when I went.  
 
Winona Weber  08:21 
That's a big school.  
 
Freda Charley  08:22 
I'd sleep on a porch, 'cause there were so many kids. I stayed in a room, had my clothes 
[inaudible]. We-- three girls in one room, but we take turns sleeping on the porch at night. But it 
was fun. Oh, the girls would sing so pretty-- 
 
Winona Weber  08:31 
Oh. 
 
Freda Charley  08:34 
--for bugle call, when they [inaudible]. They'd sing all kinds of songs out there, harmonized. 
 
Winona Weber  08:53 
Aw. That sounds like fun. 
 
Freda Charley  09:01 
[Inaudible]. 
 
Winona Weber  09:04 
Sure. Ow. 
 
Freda Charley  09:08 
Oh, how'd you [inaudible] Seattle? 
 
Winona Weber  09:12 
Hi. That was another person I was gonna go visit. 
 
Page 7 of 21 
 
Freda Charley  09:15 
Huh? 
 
Winona Weber  09:15 
That was another person that was gonna go see.  
 
Freda Charley  09:16 
Oh, uh-huh.  Have a chair.  
 
Winona Weber  09:23 
This one's kind of wobbly.  
 
Beatrice Black  09:25 
Yeah. [Inaudible]. 
 
Winona Weber  09:28 
[Inaudible]-- 
 
Beatrice Black  09:28 
[Inaudible].  
 
Winona Weber  09:29 
[Inaudible]. Yeah. feels good, doesn't it?  
 
Beatrice Black  09:42 
[Inaudible]. 
 
Winona Weber  09:42 
Yeah. Oh, I don't know.  [Inaudible]. Is that-- did you meet--? Let me just turn this around. 
Okay, this-- I know the mic is around here somewhere, but I'm not sure. 
 
Beatrice Black  10:07 
[Inaudible] how is it work? I said, "It works pretty good." I [inaudible]. 
 
Winona Weber  10:15 
Did you meet Benny at Chemawa? 
 
Freda Charley  10:18 
No, he-- 
 
Winona Weber  10:18 
How'd you meet him?  
 
Freda Charley  10:19 
He-- their family moved over here when they were about-- when he was about 12, or 13 years 
old. [?Humptulips?]. He used to live down at Humptulips.  
Page 8 of 21 
 
 
Winona Weber  10:31 
Oh, really?  
 
Freda Charley  10:31 
Gillis Slough. 
 
Winona Weber  10:33 
In where?  
 
Freda Charley  10:34 
Gillis Slough. They had a house there up on [?stilts?].  
 
Winona Weber  10:38 
Oh, really?  
 
Freda Charley  10:39 
Yeah. Close to the Humptulips River. But they lived in a slough.  
 
Winona Weber  10:46 
Yeah, there's a lot of those. 
 
Freda Charley  10:48 
[Crosstalk]. There was a lot of food for them down there, too. Fish [?two hundred?] [inaudible]. 
 
Winona Weber  10:58 
How did you get into school bus driving? 
 
Freda Charley  11:01 
Oh, during the war and they-- Jack McBride drove bus and Frankie, Pete, and-- they'd just drive 
for a couple months and then they'd quit. So, it was hard to get at one of the fishing [inaudible]. 
Well, there was nobody driving the bus, so I started. So I got the job; I applied for it and got it. 
Seventy-five dollars a month. [Laughter.] It went from $75 to $85, $95, and $105. Funny, when I 
quit I think I was making $300 and some.  
 
Winona Weber  11:39 
Three hundred dollars?  
 
Freda Charley  11:41 
[Inaudible] make very much. But now I guess they really make the money. 
 
Winona Weber  11:49 
I don't know how much they make. They-- 
 
Freda Charley  11:52 
Well, they get a lot of hours, and like [?Bernie?] gets a lot of hours.  
Page 9 of 21 
 
 
Winona Weber  11:56 
Oh, really?  
 
Freda Charley  11:58 
[Inaudible] $8 an hour. Used to [inaudible].  
 
Beatrice Black  11:59 
A lot of money for us [?in those days?] [laughs]. 
 
Winona Weber  12:03 
Yeah. 
 
Beatrice Black  12:03 
[Inaudible] today. [Inaudible]. 
 
Freda Charley  12:08 
[?Well, I'm in?] college, and I'd still be happy [laughs] with three hundred dollars a month extra. 
[Laughter.] I could use that. 
 
Beatrice Black  12:18 
I was getting $50 a month from [inaudible]. [Inaudible] $150 a month. 
 
Freda Charley  12:29 
But things were cheap then, you know? You could get a-- buy a coat for $5, pair of shoes for a 
dollar, [inaudible] 90. Bread was 10 cents; butter was 2 [?quid?]. You know, you could go to 
town with $25 and bring a cartload of groceries home. 
 
12:48 
Oh, [inaudible] groceries. 
 
Freda Charley  12:53 
Slab of bacon. Of course, that's the way we have to buy, like make two slabs of bacon and a ham. 
Oh, well, we didn't need eggs, because we had a chicken. Flour and sugar and stuff.  
 
Winona Weber  13:09 
Yeah.  
 
Freda Charley  13:09 
Benny and my dad used to go and just load the whole car loading for about $30. 
 
Beatrice Black  13:16 
[Inaudible] it wasn't as many good things to eat as it is now in [inaudible].  
 
Freda Charley  13:21 
No.  
Page 10 of 21 
 
 
Beatrice Black  13:22 
You do well to just have bread and butter [laughs]. 
 
Freda Charley  13:25 
No fresh fruit.  Food, you know.  
 
Winona Weber  13:28 
Yeah.  
 
Freda Charley  13:30 
[Inaudible] was [inaudible] then [inaudible]. 
 
Beatrice Black  13:34 
Picked berries and picked everything what we could [inaudible]. 
 
Freda Charley  13:40 
My dad had a [?roothouse?] back here, and he'd have cabbage hanging up. And he had bins for 
potatoes and onions and stuff. So we were pretty well off. Always, you know. 
 
Winona Weber  13:54 
When did he come over from Sweden? How old was he? Did he come over as an adult or 
[crosstalk]?  
 
Freda Charley  14:00 
He was 12 or [inaudible] 13.  
 
Winona Weber  14:03 
Did he come over with his family?  
 
Freda Charley  14:06 
No, he came-- --him and his brother. Boy, they'd already-- as soon as you go to school, you learn 
to pray, there in Sweden. Right from the word go.  
 
Winona Weber  14:07 
Or was he by himself?  So he was already a blacksmith?  
 
Freda Charley  14:21 
Yeah.  
 
Winona Weber  14:24 
How old was he when you and your mother got married--  
 
Freda Charley  14:27 
I don't know.  
 
Page 11 of 21 
 
Winona Weber  14:27 
--when he and your mother got married. I didn't mean [inaudible].  
 
Freda Charley  14:31 
I don't know. I don't-- I never did ask. But my cousin has a history of all that stuff. And I don't 
know where I put that letter. I put it away somewhere there. What their name was, their name 
wasn't Strong. They just shortened it. Was [inaudible], or something. So they just shortened it to 
"Strong" when they came over here. 
 
Winona Weber  14:57 
Well, a lot of times the government shortens it--  True.  --because it's too hard to write.  
 
Freda Charley  15:04 
Right.  
 
Winona Weber  15:04 
"Gonna call you Strong."  
 
Freda Charley  15:06 
Yeah, just [crosstalk]. 
 
Winona Weber  15:06 
You know, write it down when they immigrate. 
 
Freda Charley  15:09 
Like Beatrice said, in La Push, when they-- their agents first got there, the Indians didn't have a 
name. So-- they just had Indian names. So she said they named them by colors: Green, and 
Black, and Brown, and White [laughter], and Gray.  
 
Beatrice Black  15:34 
[Inaudible] Gray, White, Brown, Green. 
 
Freda Charley  15:42 
Gave them names of colors.  
 
Winona Weber  15:45 
Well, I...  
 
Freda Charley  15:48 
Their name is Black.  
 
Winona Weber  15:50 
Yeah. And I was gonna say, down on the Columbia, there was a bunch of Indians that got named 
[?Daniel?] and John and [?Anton?] [crosstalk].  
 
Beatrice Black  16:05 
Page 12 of 21 
 
[Crosstalk] named after [inaudible]. [Inaudible].  
 
Winona Weber  16:11 
[Inaudible].  
 
Freda Charley  16:11 
He was a fur buyer. 
 
Winona Weber  16:12 
[Inaudible] Oh. 
 
Beatrice Black  16:14 
He was fur buyer for--  
 
Freda Charley  16:17 
Hudson, the bay?  
 
Beatrice Black  16:21 
[Inaudible]? 
 
Freda Charley  16:21 
Hudson Bay.  
 
Beatrice Black  16:22 
Hudson Bay.  
 
Winona Weber  16:27 
Didn't they pull out? 
 
Freda Charley  16:29 
Hmm? 
 
Winona Weber  16:30 
Didn't they pull out of Washington?  
 
Freda Charley  16:32 
Hudson Bay? 
 
Winona Weber  16:33 
Yeah. I don't know if they were the ones that were British. 
 
Freda Charley  16:38 
They were-- Hudson Bay was English, I think.  
 
Winona Weber  16:41 
English, yeah.  
Page 13 of 21 
 
 
Freda Charley  16:43 
Yeah, they came here long-- were the first ones that came here and traded--  
 
Beatrice Black  16:48 
Fur company. 
 
Freda Charley  16:48 
--with the Indians . 
 
Beatrice Black  16:50 
[Inaudible] schooner. No road.  
 
Winona Weber  16:54 
Yeah. Came on a boat, huh? 
 
Beatrice Black  16:56 
[Inaudible] schooner. Yeah, they call it schooner. 
 
Winona Weber  16:59 
Yeah. Big sailing ship.  
 
Beatrice Black  17:00 
[Inaudible] masted. [Inaudible] masted. 
 
Freda Charley  17:03 
Wow. 
 
Beatrice Black  17:05 
[?And if you know?] [inaudible] [crosstalk].  
 
Freda Charley  17:09 
Big, vast ocean. 
 
Beatrice Black  17:12 
[Inaudible] things from [inaudible]. Sisters used to be strong [?and move it?]. [Inaudible].  
 
Freda Charley  17:25 
Oh.  
 
Beatrice Black  17:26 
You remember them? [Inaudible]. 
 
Freda Charley  17:28 
I remember [inaudible].  
 
Page 14 of 21 
 
Beatrice Black  17:30 
[Inaudible], and there was another one. There were three sisters. Gee, she-- one sister used to 
pack two sacks of hundred pound fl-- I mean [inaudible]-- 
 
Freda Charley  17:42 
Flour. 
 
Beatrice Black  17:43 
Three [?fifty?] pound sacks of flour. Gee, they were strong [inaudible]. 
 
Freda Charley  17:51 
Put it on their head, on their strap. That's the way Mama used to pack flour, sugar.  
 
Beatrice Black  17:58 
I used to work-- I think I was probably 50 years old, and I pack one sack at a time. 
 
Winona Weber  18:05 
How heavy were the sacks? Fifty pounds? 
 
Beatrice Black  18:09 
Fifty pounds. 
 
Winona Weber  18:10 
Still a lot. [Laughs]. 
 
Freda Charley  18:11 
Yeah. 
 
Winona Weber  18:24 
Oh, boy. Ouch, darnit.  
 
Beatrice Black  18:27 
[Inaudible] was only six years old. We got a cow. The older one got a cow [inaudible] cow, and 
then get to the cream and make a butter. [Inaudible] would be churning, walking back and forth. 
He was only six or eight years old. Walk back and forth, never sit down, just walk back [laughs] 
churning the butter in the [inaudible]. Then would finally get to the one that comes on top, you 
know. 
 
Freda Charley  19:04 
We used to make butter, but ours was this way churned. 
 
Winona Weber  19:08 
Oh, was it a handle? 
 
Freda Charley  19:13 
Yeah. [Crosstalk]. Had about three wooden paddles in there, and it would-- wouldn't take long.  
Page 15 of 21 
 
 
Beatrice Black  19:18 
[Inaudible] butter, just churn. Up and down [inaudible]. 
 
Freda Charley  19:29 
That butter would be good for a couple days, anyway, but you-- get rancid, because we didn't 
have-- we didn't have a refrigerator, or nothing. Yeah, later on, we have ice-- ice box. 
 
Winona Weber  19:44 
Would you just make butter for a day or two? 
 
Freda Charley  19:47 
Yeah. Otherwise it'd been getting rancid.  
 
Winona Weber  19:49 
Yeah. I can imagine. 
 
Beatrice Black  19:52 
[Inaudible] enough [inaudible]. Selling the [inaudible]. That way they would get money to buy 
bread [laughs]. 
 
Freda Charley  20:07 
My mother used to make 12 loaves of bread a week. Make pie [inaudible], cake [laughs]. She 
didn't make one or two, she made six or eight. 
 
Winona Weber  20:23 
How often would she bake?  
 
Freda Charley  20:25 
About once a week. Everything all at once. 
 
Winona Weber  20:29 
Big wood stove? 
 
Freda Charley  20:30 
Mm-hmm. It was a big ol' range, and it had a reservoir on the side, and you put water and then 
the water would heat in there. And then that's where you got your dishwater from.  
 
Winona Weber  20:46 
Yeah.  
 
Freda Charley  20:48 
You'd have to fill that up a couple times a day [inaudible]. Then we didn't have the running water 
when we wanted to bathe, like-- we had a bathtub.  
 
Winona Weber  21:01 
Page 16 of 21 
 
Yeah.  
 
Freda Charley  21:02 
And then we'd heat water in the tub and pour it in and then get some cold water and throw in. 
Way we had to bathe. When we were a little we bathed in a washtub. Galvanized.  
 
Beatrice Black  21:17 
[Inaudible].  
 
Freda Charley  21:19 
My pump was right over there [crosstalk]. 
 
Beatrice Black  21:25 
[Inaudible]. [Inaudible] down [inaudible]. At first they put bucket and [?heat?] it. And now, of 
course, then they start-- 
 
Freda Charley  21:33 
Pumpin'.  
 
Beatrice Black  21:34 
--pumpin' it. 
 
Freda Charley  21:37 
My dad always says the good ones had a pump, and their water never did get salty. Gee, that was 
good water. We'd go over there to get our water.  
 
Beatrice Black  21:45 
Yeah, [inaudible]. And [inaudible] I was saying that the doctor said that you would get 
[inaudible] or sick if you drink any kind of [inaudible]. [Inaudible] we used to go to up in the 
woods and there was a spring water. And we got to that and fill up the jugs, and never had to boil 
it or anything. Just drink it, spring water. 
 
Freda Charley  22:07 
One hundred percent pure, [inaudible] rocks. 
 
Winona Weber  22:29 
Spring water is the most unpolluted water around.  
 
Freda Charley  22:32 
Yeah. Like that water up there at the ranch. Boy, that's good. You make coffee, it tastes so good.  
 
Winona Weber  22:38 
Yeah.  
 
Freda Charley  22:39 
Brings out all the flavors. 
Page 17 of 21 
 
 
Winona Weber  22:40 
I was gonna ask you something, but I forgot already. [Laughs]. 
 
Freda Charley  22:48 
Yeah. 
 
Winona Weber  22:49 
I hate that. Talking about the spring... Oh!  Were you one of the ones that used to swim with 
Grandma [?Bum?] out here? 
 
Freda Charley  23:06 
Yeah, we used to always go swimming.  
 
Winona Weber  23:09 
You go swim out in the ocean?  
 
Freda Charley  23:11 
Oh, once. Crazy, [?thought I would drown?] out there.  
 
Winona Weber  23:16 
Yeah. What? Was it too cold, or were the currents too strong?  
 
Freda Charley  23:24 
Too strong out there. We never allow our children to swim out there because there's the deep, 
you know, deep channel that the river flows out; it could carry you out on the--  The current's too 
strong. All right to swim on the other beach, [inaudible] Landing, but not here, because the river. 
 
Winona Weber  23:38 
Yeah. Yeah, it's really [inaudible]. Well, I suppose you swam quite a bit in the river here though.  
 
Freda Charley  23:58 
Oh, my. Across the river and back. [?Molly?] was a good swimmer. She used to beat me; she 
used to always [inaudible] and beat me. 
 
Beatrice Black  24:08 
We used to [inaudible] the water from the river. 
 
Winona Weber  24:13 
How far upriver would you have to go to get fresh water in the summer, if you wanted it?  
 
Freda Charley  24:19 
We didn't, we just swum across [inaudible] spring. We got to go on a skip across the river. But 
now we go up the ranch and there's no [inaudible]. Like, every summer we'd [?saltwater?] here. 
 
Winona Weber  24:34 
Page 18 of 21 
 
Yeah, I know. 
 
Freda Charley  24:35 
Terrible. Used to get us some good water. Too many homes now on that little spring. With-- like 
I was [inaudible] there's a spring up there. The water just-- it's like a falls up there, where we 
used to farm. Seemed like they'd harness that up. Even in the summer, it just really rushes out of 
there.  
 
Winona Weber  24:59 
A lot of water.  
 
Freda Charley  25:00 
Yeah? Good water. Spring water. 
 
Winona Weber  25:06 
[?I?] wonder. 
 
Freda Charley  25:07 
And it's not far either. [Inaudible] [?uphill?] up the river. 
 
Winona Weber  25:12 
I keep hearing of problems, you know, in the summer with the water. 
 
Freda Charley  25:18 
Yeah, terrible.  
 
Winona Weber  25:18 
Don't have water, or they're getting saltwater.  
 
Freda Charley  25:22 
Yeah. That just ruins all our appliances, you know, our electric [inaudible].  
 
Winona Weber  25:27 
[Laughs] I'll bet.  
 
Freda Charley  25:29 
Everything's [inaudible] [?couplings?], you know. 
 
Winona Weber  25:32 
Yeah, you have to get in, put [inaudible] on all your--  
 
Freda Charley  25:36 
Yeah, that's salt. Then you have to wash your clothes in it.  
 
Winona Weber  25:43 
Yeah.  
Page 19 of 21 
 
 
Freda Charley  25:45 
You're stiff, you feel stiff. 
 
Winona Weber  25:54 
Yeah, I can imagine, that would--  
 
Beatrice Black  25:57 
[Inaudible] and then probably [inaudible]. 
 
Freda Charley  26:00 
Well, they digged-- they put a well in [inaudible] in the river.  
 
Beatrice Black  26:05 
Yeah.  
 
Freda Charley  26:06 
They put a well down to the river. And then we were getting the river water. All that [?back 
current?] was coming in. I think now that's what we're drinking, is that water [inaudible], 
because it tastes like river water to me. We're not getting spring water anymore. 
 
Winona Weber  26:29 
Used to be a good [inaudible]. 
 
Freda Charley  26:31 
I was supposed to be going to-- [clock chimes] 
 
Winona Weber  26:44 
[Inaudible]?  
 
Freda Charley  26:44 
--the Chokers play pretty soon. 
 
Winona Weber  26:47 
Oh that's right. [Inaudible]'s playing. 
 
Freda Charley  26:52 
They got beat real bad by Yakima. 
 
Winona Weber  26:56 
Oh, no. 
 
Freda Charley  26:57 
Gee, about 12 or 14 points. That's some tall girls. They didn't start [?Maryanne?] or some of 
those girls until 16-2. Two! Before they put [?Maryanne?] and them in.  
 
Page 20 of 21 
 
Winona Weber  27:11 
Yeah. 
 
Freda Charley  27:19 
[Inaudible]. [Inaudible] they were doing anything. 
 
Winona Weber  27:30 
When you were in high school and you were playing basketball, did you play against other 
schools?  
 
Freda Charley  27:35 
Oh, yeah. We'd play. We traveled around, you know, the farming communities around there. We 
always were treated nice, too, there. Those farming communities, they'd always have big 
lunches.  
 
Winona Weber  27:56 
Sounds good.  
 
Freda Charley  27:57 
The girls from the other team would-- they'd always have a big table, you know for after the 
game, and they'd sit with us when we ate. Think farming communities, they had lots of good 
goodies. [Inaudible] chicken, everything.  Well, I also was in the choir, the Octette-- in the 
Octette for girls. Sang. And we'd go to Salem Chamber of Commerce and to Portland to sing, to 
different churches and stuff. And when like those farming communities around there would 
[inaudible] raising money for Christmas, then we'd go as their entertainers to sing and recite. 
 
Winona Weber  28:56 
Yeah. 
 
Freda Charley  28:57 
And do all those solos, and octets, and quartets. Then they'd feed us snacks [inaudible] that's all 
we've got. We were are always hungry in the mornings [inaudible] much to eat. Nothing good, 
you know. 
 
Winona Weber  29:17 
Well, what would you have at a meal at a boarding school?  
 
Beatrice Black  29:20 
I used to [?sing?] [inaudible] [?girls?].  
 
Freda Charley  29:22 
Oh, we had a lot of meat every day. We had roast. And then I can remember on Sundays, we 
always had weenies, and with pink gravy, because the weenies were red, you know? Then they'd 
make gravy out of that juice. [inaudible] oh, that was good. And we had potatoes and coleslaw, 
stuff like that. Sauerkraut. They fed us good, but there were so many, you know, didn't get too 
much, you know.  
Page 21 of 21 
 
 
Winona Weber  29:50 
Just not a lot. 
 
Freda Charley  29:51 
Every morning we had mush and homemade-- we also had homemade bread and homemade 
butter. And on the Sundays, Sunday morning, everybody had cornflakes. And boy, you ought to 
hear that. Soon as you sat down, everybody starts pouring cornflakes, you'd hear [imitates high 
frequency noise]. Take about 1000 kids eating cornflakes. Boy, that makes a lot of noise 
[laughter]. Every Sunday morning we had cornflakes. 
 
Beatrice Black  30:27 
[?You used to be so skinny?].  
 
Freda Charley  30:28 
And then the rest of the times we've had mush, but we had milk that had big lumps of cream in it, 
you know? We got fed good, but it's not home where you can get a slice of bread when you want 
it, or-- 
 
Winona Weber  30:45 
Yeah.  
 
Freda Charley  30:47 
My mother used to send me smoked fish, dried fish, or jerky, or something to chew on. One time 
she sent me a box full of bluebacks, dried and done. I just got to taste it. Somebody stole it right 
out of the hospital.  
 
Winona Weber  31:03 
Oh.  
 
Freda Charley  31:05 
Stole the whole thing. I told her, "Don't [inaudible]--" 
 
 
 
 
 