When applying for a position in 1934 at Whitethorn I wore a white dress I’d been wearing in San Jose at college. One of the trustees looked at me and said, “You can’t wear that kind of dress out here. You’ll be chasing the big boys through the thorn brush, and you’ll get it torn.”

The children wanted to try out this city-bred teacher in a number of ways. First they brought me a bouquet of poison oak to which I wasn’t allergic at that time. Next they stuck a dead bird in my desk drawer. Again I made no fuss. Every afternoon I read a continued story to them for 15 minutes. One day I noticed I didn’t have their attention and casually strolled over to see the chalk rail where their eyes all were and noticed it filled with detestable water dogs. I closed the book and said I guessed they’d rather spend the time discussing salamanders. First, however, the poor things were going to die if they continued to be kept in that extra-dusty chalk tray. I thought it best to return them to the river and then we’d talk. That was the easy way to get them out of my sight!

One morning as I went out for school, a little game banty cock with spurs (never penned up) flew at me and got mud all over me. I furiously grabbed him by the feet and stuck him head down into the rain barrel for some time. My lesson didn’t do him any good. Mrs. Robinson always went with a broom in her hand to fend him off.

I washed on a scrub board, ironed with a flat-iron in terribly hot weather with no ironing board, and always helped Mrs. Robinson with the dishes at night.

The salary was $1,215 for the nine month term. Because of heavy rains the school was closed for a while each winter. Board and room was $35 a month. That first Christmas vacation I had a doctor and hospital bill and was still able to send home $35 a month to repay for my education. There was not much chance to spend money except on the rare occasions I “went to town” — to Briceland with the Robinsons.

In February, one Sunday afternoon, Ben Sutherland and his sister, Florence Sutherland Goff, who now lives at Whitethorn, drove by looking for members to join the Grange. He asked me to ride with them. This opened up my social life! The next week his brother Robert took me into Eureka. From then on nearly every weekend was spent at Ettersburg with the Sutherland family. The girls and I spent much time looking over the “wish books” — Sears, Montgomery Ward, and National Bellas Hess catalogs, but we didn’t do any ordering to speak of. Often on Saturday evenings members of the family drove to the dance at Garberville. When roads were bad, we went in the big truck, and Ben had shovels and hip boots in back in case of a slide.

Huckleberries were prolific so the bushes were actually stripped. Mr. Robinson hooked up a slanted screen to the car motor. While the berries rolled down the screen, the wind from the motor blew out the leaves and the screen caught the stems. Mrs. Robinson canned many quarts of them and made delicious pies. She had a tin-can canning machine and-canned much fish, venison, and pork. Her tamale pies were super. Mrs. Sutherland (still living at 96 in Whitethorn) used to can 500 quarts of peaches when Robert went to the Valley each year and brought back a truck load. There were always peaches on the table. These ladies had to make their own bread and butter, too. At Whitethorn when the only cow went dry, we were without milk, except canned, which I didn’t relish on cereal or for drinking. At Ettersburg there was goat’s milk.

On my way to school I passed Vernon McKee’s apple orchard, where many apples lay on the ground. One day I asked if I could take the older boys over and pick up some for their lunches. He agreed, and Wayne Robinson got the car so we got a boxful, which was also stashed under my bed. Each day the children had an apple added to their lunch. Then during the very cold weather I concocted something warm and charged them two or three pennies — just to pay for materials.

There were two crimes committed in the community while I was there which were upsetting. One Sunday we were invited to a home to dinner, an unusual experience. While eating, the hostess was busy in the kitchen and elsewhere as well. When we were ready to leave, Mrs. Robinson’s purse could not be found! This happened the day after pay day, and it was known by the tire tracks in the road that the Robinsons had gone to Briceland to cash my check. My purse was left alone, for I had no money in it.

By studying the tire marks again the next day the Robinsons knew our host went to Briceland that day so they drove down to the empty home. In the ashes they found the remains of the purse. Finally a settlement was made, but not a financial one.

The other incident happened the last day of school in 1935. When I arrived at school, Fred Quinn from Eureka, a federal agent, told me he was going to arrest a certain person who was transporting the children to school that day, for maintaining a still. I didn’t want the children to see this happen so rang the bell early, but I couldn’t get them in fast enough. A strange car in the area was a attraction for sure!

Alta Farnsworth and Vivian Lewis were always trying to fix me up with a “date,” but I was to go meet him, not the other way around. Alta was finally sent to Eureka Junior High so we lost one of our good singers.

On another occasion the entire upper grade group decided to play hookey in the afternoon. They just hid up the hill behind the school where I couldn’t see them so I went on with the primary grades. However, that day the car of Joe Mitchell from Briceland drove onto the school grounds. They were so anxious to find out if I were going to go out with him that they returned to school. Foiled again!

The three-room cabin in which I lived was about a mile from the school and was lived in by the Oscar Robinson family. It was built like the school — batten-board. There were no doors inside the house so the two bedrooms were partitioned off by a thin cretonne curtain. Wayne, an eighth grader, slept on a cot in the living room-kitchen until the barn was completed. At first there was no sink, but finally Mr. Robinson put one in, the water draining out onto the ground outside. The water used had to be carried up a hill from the river in buckets.

When it was warm, I used to let the children in the afternoon stick their feet in the river while I walked up and down the row hearing their lessons. When I arrived home, I donned a bathing suit, took a bar of soap and a towel, and went bathing in a little pool where I could get in two-three strokes of swimming. In the winter more primitive methods of bathing had to be employed.

At first there was only one lamp so we all sat around the table at night. Mrs. Robinson used a little cigarette-making machine so there’d be enough for the two of them for the next day. I generally did school work, although I did hem 12 large-sized linen napkins and pieced a quilt. Mrs. Lewis, one of the mothers who transported the children living in northern Mendocino as well as the children on the road to the school, agreed to quilt it for me. The price arrived at without finishing the edges, which I wanted to do, was $2.50! The worst was, the filler was wool and much harder to work on. One day Vivian Lewis reported to me that her mother was going to have to charge me more than planned. I asked, “How much?” The reply was “25 cents more.” (Recently I embroidered squares, sewed them together for a spread, and paid $75 to have it quilted without edges finished.) How poor Mrs. Lewis had to work for her small fee!

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The piece above was printed in the July-August 1982 issue of the Humboldt Historian, a journal of the Humboldt County Historical Society. It is reprinted here with permission. The Humboldt County Historical Society is a nonprofit organization devoted to archiving, preserving and sharing Humboldt County’s rich history. You can become a member and receive a year’s worth of new issues of The Humboldt Historian at this link.